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Abode 


ERASMUS 


Observations  on  aTour|from  Ci 

the   Indian    Caucasus,    THpoirni   nnr    ■  ■— 
Upper   Valleys  of  the 
Himalaya 


ANDREW    WILSON 

(reprinted   from   "Blackwood's   magazine.") 


NEW   YORK 

G.    P.   PUTNAM'S   SONS 

27  and  29  West  23d  Street 
1882 


V\  u'v 


NOTE  OF  THE  AMERICAN  PUBLISHERS. 

In  presenting  to  the  American  public  this  edition 
of  Mr.  Wilson's  "  Abode  of  Snow,"  the  Publishers 
deem  it  due  to  the  author  to  explain  that  it  has  been 
reprinted  from  the  original  articles  as  first  issued  in 
"  Blackwood's  Magazine,"  and  that  it  will  be  found  to 
differ  in  some  few  points  from  the  volume  published 
in  Edinburgh.  Through  a  misunderstanding  on  their 
part  as  to  the  plan  of  Messrs.  Blackwood  for  the  is- 
suing of  their  edition,  and  the  failure  to  reach  them 
of  the  full  information  concerning  this,  they  had*  not 
been  made  aware  that  any  changes  in  his  Magazine 
material  had  been  contemplated  by  the  author,  and 
when  word  concerning  these  finally  reached  them, 
their  edition  was  already  stereotyped  and  ready  for 
the  printer. 

They  have  added  to  this  the  author's  preface,  and 
the  Map  and  vignette  title  from  the  Edinburgh  vol- 
ume, and  they  plan  to  incorporate  in  future  editions, 
as  far  as  practicable,  such  additions  to  his  Magazine 
papers  as  the  author  has  found  desirable.  The  articles 
in  the  Magazine  give,  however,  not  only  the  complete 
narrative,  but  a  narrative  which,  carefully  revised  up  to 
the  standard  of  "  Maga,"  and  certainly  evincing  no 
want  of  literary  finish,  forms  a  work  of  permanent 
value,  possessing  an  exceptional  freshness  and  novelty 
and  one  that  will  without  question  meet  with  the 
hearty  appreciation  of  many  American  readers. 

New  York,  Sept.,  1875.      . 


PREFACE 


TO  THE  ENGLISH  EDITION. 


In  the  sixth  chapter  of  this  work,  I  have  fully 
explained  how  the  phrase  "  Abode  of  Snow  "  is  a 
literal  translation  of  the  Sanscrit  compound  "  Hima- 
laya," and  therefore  forms  an  appropriate  title  for  a 
work  treating  of  those  giant  mountains.  The  Abode 
of  Snow  par  excellence  is  not  in  the  Himalaya,  or  even 
in  the  Arctic  region,  but  (setting  Saturn  aside)  in  the 
Antarctic  region.  Owing  to  the  greater  preponde- 
rance of  ocean  in  the  southern  hemisphere,  the  great- 
est accumulation  of  ice  is  round  the  South  Pole ;  and 
hence  the  not  improbable  theory  that,  when  the  ac- 
cumulation has  reached  a  certain  point,  the  balance 
of  the  earth  must  be  suddenly  destroyed,  and  this  orb 
shall  almost  instantaneously  turn  transversely  to  its 
axis,  moving  the  great  oceans,  and  so  producing  one 
of  those  cyclical  catastrophes  which,  there  is  some 
reason  to  believe,  have  before  now  interfered  with 
the  development  and  the  civilisation  of  the  human 
race. 

How  near  such  a  catastrophe  may  be,  and  whether, 
when  it  occurs,  a  few  just  men  (and,  it  is  to  be  hoped, 
women  also)  will  certainly  be  left  in  the  upper  valleys 
of  the  Himalaya,  I  am  unable  to  say;  but  it  is  well  to 


vi  PREFACE. 

know  that  there  is  an  elevated  and  habitable  region  of 
the  earth  which  is  likely  to  be  left  undepopulated  even 
by  such  an  event  as  that  just  alluded  to.  Whether 
humanity  will  lose  or  gain  by  having  to  begin  again 
from  the  simple  starting-point  of  "  Om  mani  padme 
haun "  {vide  p.  257)  is  also  a  subject  on  which  I 
feel  a  little  uncertain ;  but  we  may  at  least  hope 
that  the  jewel  in  the  lotus  will  not  be  lost ;  that 
what  has  accrued  to  it  from  the  efforts  and  the  agony 
of  so  many  thousand  years,  of  so  many  hundreds  of 
human  generations,  may  pass  over  to  the  inhabitants 
of  a  newly-formed  earth.  And  when  we  come  to  con- 
sider what  the  grand  valuable  results  of  this  our  awful 
striving,  our  dread  history,  have  been,  most  of  what 
we  are  given  to  boast  of  will  have  to  be  relinquished 
as  worthless,  and  we  may,  even  as  Christians,  be  glad 
to  take  refuge  in  the  comprehensive  Lama  prayer,  "  O 
God,  consider  the  jewel  in  the  lotus.  Thy  will  be 
done."  For,  however  appalling  may  have  been  the 
amount  of  human  crime  and  woe,  however  pitiable  our 
mistakes  and  ineffectual  our  struggles,  there  has  ever 
been  a  jewel  in  the  rank  lotus  of  human  life — some- 
thing beautiful  in  it  which  is  not  of  it,  yet  is  mysteri- 
ously connected  with,  and  hidden  within,  it.  Viewed 
in  this  light  the  Lama  prayer  has  a  touching  signifi- 
cance, and  is  not  without  a  great  lesson  for  us  all. 

But  the  Himalaya  may  have  many  visitors  before 
that  other  Abode  of  Snow  turns  things  topsy-turvy,  if 
it  ever  do  so ;  and  these,  I  hope,  may  find  my  book  of 
some  service.  It  was  not  for  them,  however,  that  this 
volume  was  written,  but  for  those  who  have  never 
seen  and  may  never  see  the  Himalaya.  I  have  sought, 
in  however  imperfect  a  manner,  to  enable  such  readers 


PREFACE. 


in  some  degree  to  realise  what  these  great  mountains 
are — what  scenes  of  beauty  and  grandeur  they  present 
— what  is  the  character  of  the  simple  people  who  dwell 
among  them — and  what  are  the  incidents  the  traveller 
meets  with,  his  means  of  conveyance,  and  his  mode  of 
life.  In  attempting  this  I  have  had  to  struggle  with 
what  a  kindly  critic  has  called  "the  utterly  unknown," 
and  have  been  compelled,  as  a  necessary  part  of  the 
enterprise,  to  make  my  pages  bristle  with  names  and 
other  words  which  are  quite  unfamiliar,  and  indeed  for 
the  most  part  entirely  new,  to  the  ordinary  English 
reader — the  very  individual  whose  interest  I  want  to 
engage.  It  has  also  been  necessary  to  introduce  some 
details  of  physical  science,  ethnology,  archaeology,  and 
history ;  but  these  have  been  subordinated  to  the  gene- 
ral aim  of  producing  an  intelligible  idea  of  the  region 
described.  Perhaps  I  may  be  excused  for  suggesting 
that  some  little  effort  on  the  reader's  part  is  also  called 
for,  if  indeed  my  labours  are  of  any  value, — which  I 
am  by  no  means  sure  of. 

If  there  were  any  merit  at  all  in  my  journey  it  lay 
only  in  the  condition  of  body  in  which  I  commenced 
it  and  carried  it  through,  and  in  the  determination 
with  which,  despite  serious  discouragement,  I  pursued 
what  appeared  to  be  a  desperate  remedy.  My  original 
intention  was  only  to  visit  Masiiri  and  Simla,  and  have 
a  distant  view  of  the  Himalaya;  but  the  first  glimpse 
of  the  Jumnotri  and  Gangotri  peaks  excited  longings 
which  there  was  no  need  to  restrain,  and  I  soon  per- 
ceived that  the  air  of  the  hill-stations  could  be  of  no 
use  to  me.  So  I  set  off  from  Simla,  determined  above 
all  things  to  keep  as  high  up  as  I  could,  and  to  have  a 
snowy  range  between  me  and  the  Indian  monsoon, 


viii  PREFACE. 

and  then,  so  far  as  consonant  with  that,  to  visit  as 
many  places  of  interest  as  possible.  It  probably 
would  have  been  better  had  I  been  able  to  take  more 
notes  on  the  way ;  but  the  great  fatigue  of  the  jour- 
ney, and  the  strain  arising  from  my  being  alone,  were 
rather  too  much  for  me ;  and  sometimes,  for  several 
days  at  a  time,  I  could  do  no  more  than  note  down 
the  name  of  the  village  where  we  camped,  and  the 
temperature  at  day-break. 

There  are  many  subjects,  especially  relating  to  the 
latter  part  of  my  journey,  on  which  I  wished  to  write 
at  length,  but  found  it  inexpedient  to  do  so  in  order 
not  longer  to  delay  the  publication  of  this  volume.  As 
it  is,  I  feel  deeply  indebted  for  its  having  been  written 
at  all  to  the  encouragement,  consideration,  and  ad- 
vice of  Mr.  Blackwood,  the  Editor  of  the  famous 
Magazine  which  bears  his  name,  and  in  which  a  great 
part,  but  not  the  whole,  of  this  narrative  originally 
appeared.  From  the  outset  he  sympathised  warmly 
with  my  plan,  and  throughout  he  never  failed  to 
cheer  my  flagging  spirits  with  generous  praise,  not  to 
speak  of  other  encouragement.  Then  he  gave  me  a 
great  deal  of  admirable  advice.  There  is  nothing  that 
is  commoner  in  this  world  than  advice — nothing  that 
is  showered  down  upon  one  with  more  liberal  profu- 
sion ;  but  there  is  nothing  rarer  than  judicious,  useful 
advice,  the  first  condition  of  which  is  sympathetic 
appreciation  of  what  one  would  be  at ;  and  it  was  this 
invaluable  kind  of  advice  which  Mr.  Blackwood  freely 
tendered,  pointing  out  where  the  treatment  of  my 
subject  required  expansion,  or  aiding  me  by  his 
knowledge  of  the  world  and  profoundly  appreciative 
literary  taste.     I  am  charmed  to  find  that  the  lotus  of 


PREFACE. 


literature  contains  such  a  jewel ;  and  I  must  say,  also, 
that  both  the  Messrs.  Blackwood  did  me  essential 
service  by  the  consideration  they  displayed  when  I 
sent  in  my  manuscript  at  unreasonable  times,  or  al- 
tered proofs  unmercifully  at  the  last  moment.  Prince 
Bismarck  said  to  Count  Arnim  that  the  business  of  the 
Prussian  Foreign  Office  could  not  be  carried  on  if 
every  Embassy  were  to  conduct  itself  in  the  way  that 
of  Paris  did ;  and  I  am  sure  the  business  of  Maga 
could  not  be  carried  on  at  all  if  all  its  contributors 
were  to  try  its  patience  as  I  did. 

I  was  much  indebted  also  to  an  old  friend — a  genius 
loci  and  yet  a  man  of  European  celebrity — who  at  the 
commencement  of  the  appearance  of  my  articles  wrote 
to  me  in  terms  of  the  warmest  encouragement.  It  may 
be  that  the  favour  with  which  the  original  articles  ap- 
pear to  have  been  received  may  stand  in  the  way  of 
success  now  that  they  are  reproduced  in  book-form  ; 
so  I  may  mention  that,  though  long  passages  have 
not  been  added  to  this  reprint,  yet  very  many  short 
ones  have ;  the  interstices,  so  to  speak,  have  been 
filled  up  ;  greater  accuracy  has  been  attained;  and  the 
whole  work  has  been  recast,  and  that  into  a  form 
which,  I  venture  to  believe,  will  make  it  more  accept- 
able to  all  readers;  and  I  am  led  to  hope  that  this 
may  be  so,  among  other  reasons,  by  the  fact  that  an 
American  publishing  house,  G.  P.  Putman's  Sons, 
New  York,  has  already  prepared  stereotyped  plates 
of  my  book,  \vith  a  view  to  republication  across  the 
Atlantic. 

I  feel  some  regret  at  not  having  been  able  either  to 
repress  my  outbreaks  on  the  difficult  subject  of  the 
policy  which  ought  to  be  pursued  in  governing  India, 


x  PREFACE. 

or  to  enter  into  the  question  in  a  fuller  and  more 
satisfactory  manner  than  I  have  done ;  but  while  that 
subject  lay  beyond  the  proper  scope  of  this  work,  it 
was  one  which  the  incidents  of  my  journey  naturally 
led  me  incidentally  to  refer  to.  I  shall  now  only 
express  my  profound  conviction,  that  if  India  were 
more  directly  governed  with  an  enlightened  view  to 
our  own  national  interests  than  it  is  at  present,  it 
would  be  far  better  for  the  people  of  India;  that  it  is* 
the  English  in  India,  far  more  than  the  Bengal  ryot, 
the  educated  native,  or  the  Indian  Prince,  who  have 
reason  to  complain  of  the  British  Raj ;  and  that,  under 
a  superficial  appearance  of  contentment  and  progress, 
there  are  gathering  forces,  mostly  powerless  for  good, 
which  may  at  any  moment  break  forth  with  destruc- 
tive fury,  and  are  certain  to  do  so  whenever  the  ener- 
gies of  this  country  are  more  fully  occupied  else- 
where. 

It  may  be  fancied  that  some  of  my  descriptions  of 
what  I  encountered  among  the  Himalaya  are  some- 
what exaggerated,  and  especially,  I  understand,  the 
achievements  of  the  little  pony  which  carried  me  over 
the  great  Shigri  glacier.  A  lady  writing  to  me  on 
this  subject  remarks:  "Had  I  not  known  you  to  be 
scrupulously  truthful — in  fact,  fastidiously  careful  in 
the  use  of  language,  lest  it  might  convey  a  shade  of 
meaning  beyond  the  thought,  opinion,  or  fact,  you 
wished  to  express — I  might  have  regarded  some  of 
your  descriptions  as  exaggerated  ;  but  I  consider  accu- 
racy, both  verbal  (that  is,  in  the  use  of  words)  and  in 
the  statement  of  facts,  to  be  one  of  your  strong  points 
— barring  and  excepting  in  the  making  of  promises 
with  respect  to  letter- writing."     So  I  have  carefully 


PREFACE.  Xi 

reconsidered  everything  which  might  appear  to  bear 
the  marks  of  exaggeration,  and,  while  finding  almost 
nothing  to  alter'on  that  ground,  have  thought  it  best 
to  say  nothing  about  one  or  two  incidents  which 
might  really  appear  incredible.  I  have  only  to  add 
on  this  subject,  that  the  state  of  Himalayan  paths 
differs  somewhat  from  year  to  year,  according  to  the 
amount  of  labour  expended  upon  them,  and  the  land- 
slips which  occur. 

One  word  more,  and  I  have  done.  Like  many  other 
men,  I  have  written  hundreds — I  may  say  thousands 
— of  more  or  less  insignificant  articles  in  newspapers 
and  periodicals  ;  but,  like  the  vast  majority  of  my  fel- 
low-labourers in  that  department  of  literature,  I  have 
sought  to  keep  back  my  name  rather  than  to  thrust  it 
obtrusively  before  the  public  in  connection  with  pro- 
ductions which,  however  good  or  bad  of  their  kind. 
had  no  individuality  or  importance  sufficient  to  war- 
rant their  being  connected  with  any  particular  author. 
That  is  the  usual  feeling  of  public  writers  in  this 
country  ;  but  there  is  always  some  one  insensible  to  it. 
A  few  months  ago  one  of  those  candid  friends  who  are 
the  gentian  and  rhubarb  of  life,  remarked  to  me  : 
"  What  a  stupid  article  that  is  on  the  CUTTLE-FISH 

which  you  have  in  !     I  wonder  you  put  your 

name  to  it."  Now  the  cuttle-fish  is  a  denizen  of  the 
ocean  with  which  I  am  well  acquainted,  from  its 
toughness  as  an  article  of  diet,  it  having  been  the 
habit  of  my  Hong-Kong  butler  to  give  me  a  curry  of 
it  whenever  he  was  displeased  with  me,  adding,  when 
he  saw  my  frown,  the  dubious  consolation  :  "  Eh  !  No 
likey?  I  tinkee  he  makee  you  likey  to-mollow  (to- 
morrow) cully  too  muchee."     But  to  write  articles  on 


xii  PREFA  CE. 

the  cuttle-fish  was,  I  knew,  out  of  my  line;  and  I 
was  shocked  at  having  my  name  pointed  out  to  me, 
printed  in  full,  at  the  bottom  of  such  an  article.  At 
first  I  cherished  the  hope  that  this  was  the  work  of 
some  practical  humourist  ;  but  found  on  inquiry,  that 
this  alter  ego,  the  cuttle-fish  A.  W.,  was  a  sad  reality 
that  he  had  published  several  articles  of  the  same 
kind,  and  had  as  much  title  as  myself  to  the  name 
\ie  br?ars.  I  know  how  vain  it  is  to  hope  that  any 
pushing  young  Scotchman  will  consent  to  preach  be- 
hind a  screen  if  he  has  any  opportunity  of  doing  so  in 
front  of  it ;  therefore  I  address  no  remonstrance  or 
request  to  the  ichthyologist  himself.  But,  would  not 
some  Scotch  University — say  Aberdeen  or  Glasgow — 
have  the  goodness  to  make  a  distinction  between  us 
by  conferring  upon  him  the  degree  of  D.D.,  LL.D., 
or  whatever  other  high  academical  distinction  his  ar- 
duous researches  into  the  character  of  the  cuttle-fish 
may  justify? 
London,  July,  1875. 


PREFA  CE.  xiii 

the  substitution  of  u  for  oo,  of  £  for  ee,  and  the  expres- 
sion of  broad  a  by  a.  It  totally  ignores  the  genius  of 
the  English  language,  and  may  be  considered  as  an- 
other instance  of  that  subjection  of  England  to  India 
which  has  been  going  on  of  late  years.  Another 
objection  to  it  is,  that  it  is  not  thoroughgoing,  and  is 
apt  to  land  the  a  and  the  21  sounds  in  hopeless  confu- 
sion ;  while  a  third  is,  that  it  is  liable  to  mislead  from 
its  employment  of  accents  in  a  different  sense  from 
that  which  they  have,  except  incidentally,  in  European 
languages.  But  I  doubt  not  these  objections  have 
been  duly  considered  by  the  promoters  of  the  system, 
and  that  they  have  followed  the  plan  which  seemed  to 
them  best  fitted  to  procure  uniformity  in  the  spelling 
of  Indian  names,  which  is  an  end  of  so  great  impor- 
tance that  I  have  deemed  it  right  to  follow  the  Govern- 
ment system  of  spelling,  but  not  as  a  very  advanced 
or  always  strictly  accurate  disciple.  I  am  afraid  an 
accent  here  and  there  has  got  on  the  wrong  letter,  and 
I  have  sometimes  continued  the  use  of  double  letters; 
but,  in  truth,  to  carry  out  this  system  with  perfect 
accuracy  one  would  require  not  only  to  have  the 
names  before  one  written  in  an  Indo-Aryan  language, 
but  also  to  be  in  the  habit  of  dealing  with  them  in 
such  a  language.  Suffice  that  I  have  sacrificed  my 
own  comfort,  if  not  also  that  of  my  readers,  on  the 
Indian  Government's  linguistic  altar.  As  one  of  the 
first  to  do  so  in  this  country,  I  trust  I  may  be  excused 
if  my  steps  have  occasionally  tripped.  When  publish- 
ing in  the  Magazine  I  used  the  word  "  Himaliya,"  but 
that  was  only  in  order  to  break  the  usual  custom  of 
pronouncing  it  "  Himmalaya,"  and  now  return  to 
what  is  the  more  strictly  accurate  form. 


xiv  PREFACE. 

One  word  more,  and  I  have  done.  Like  many  other 
men,  I  have  written  hundreds — I  may  say  thousands 
— of  more  or  less  insignificant  articles  in  newspapers 
and  periodicals  ;  but,  like  the  vast  majority  of  my  fel- 
low-labourers in  that  department  of  literature,  I  have 
sought  to  keep  back  my  name  rather  than  to  thrust  it 
obtrusively  before  the  public  in  connection  with  pro- 
ductions which,  however  good  or  bad  of  their  kind, 
had  no  individuality  or  importance  sufficient  to  war- 
rant their  being  connected  with  any  particular  author. 
That  is  the  usual  feeling  of  public  writers  in  this 
country;  but  there  is  always  some  one  insensible  to  it. 
A  few  months  ago  one  of  those  candid  friends  who  are 
the  gentian  and  rhubarb  of  life,  remarked  to  me  : 
"  What  a  stupid  article  that  is  on  the  CUTTLE-FISH 

which  you  have  in  !     I  wonder  you  put  your 

name  to  it."  Now  the  cuttle-fish  is  a  denizen  of  the 
ocean  with  which  I  am  well  acquainted,  from  its 
toughness  as  an  article  of  diet,  it  having  been  the 
habit  of  my  Hong-Kong  butler  to  give  me  a  curry  of 
it  whenever  he  was  displeased  with  me,  adding,  when 
he  saw  my  frown,  the  dubious  consolation  :  "  Eh  !  No 
likey?  I  tinkee  he  makee  you  likey  to-mollow  (to- 
. morrow)  cully  too  muchee."  But  to  write  articles  on 
the  cuttle-fish  was,  I  knew,  out  of  my  line;  and  I 
was  shocked  at  having  my  name  pointed  out  to  me, 
printed  in  full,  at  the  bottom  of  such  an  article.  At 
first  I  cherished  the  hope  that  this  was  the  work  of 
some  practical  humourist  ;  but  found  on  inquiry,  that 
this  alter  ego,  the  cuttle-fish  A.  W.,  was  a  sad  reality 
that  he  had  published  several  articles  of  the  same 
kind,  and  had  as  much  title  as  myself  to  the  name 
be  boars.     I  know  how  vain  it  is  to  hope  that  any 


PREFACE. 


pushing  young  Scotchman  will  consent  to  preach  be- 
hind a  screen  if  he  has  any  opportunity  of  doing  so  in 
front  of  it;  therefore  I  address  no  remonstrance  or 
request  to  the  ichthyologist  himself.  But,  would  not 
some  Scotch  University — say  Aberdeen  or  Glasgow — ■ 
have  the  goodness  to  make  a  distinction  between  us 
by  conferring  upon  him  the  degree  of  D.D.,  LL.D., 
or  whatever  other  high  academical  distinction  his  ar- 
duous researches  into  the  character  of  the  cuttle-fish 
may  justify? 
London,  July,  1875. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  L 

TO  THE  HEIGHTS      .  .  .  .  *  .8 

CHAPTER  IL 

SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES  •».,,& 

CHAPTER  III. 

THE  VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH  ,  4  ,  frtf 

CHAPTER  IV. 

CHINKoE  TARTARS     ......  .121 

CHAPTER  V 

HANGRANG,   SPITI,  AND  TIBETAN   POLYANDRY       .  ,  ,        159 

CHAPTER  VI. 

SHIGRI   AND   ITS   GLACIERS — THE  ALPS   AND   HIMALIYA  .        195 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

ZANSKAR         ••...«!',         230 

CHAPTER  VI IL 

KASHMIR  .»...»«•        273 

CHAPTER  IX. 

SCENES   IN   KASHMIR  ...  «  310 

CHAPTER  X. 

THE    AFGHAN    BORDER  j  »  ,        340 


THE  ABODE   OF-  SNOW. 


CHAPTER  I. 

TO     THE    HEIGHTS. 

I  HAVE  heard  of  an  American  backwoodsman  who,  on 
finding  some  people  camping  about  twenty  miles  from 
his  log-cabin,  rushed  back  in  consternation  to  his  wife 
and  exclaimed,  "  Pack  thee  up,  Martha — pack  thee  up ; 
it's  getting  altogether  too  crowded  hereabouts."  The 
annoyance  which  this  worthy  complained  of  is  very 
generally  felt  at  present ;  and,  go  almost  where  he  may, 
the  lover  of  peace  and  solitude  will  soon  have  reason  to 
complain  that  the  country  round  him  is  becoming  "  alto- 
gether too  crowded."  As  for  the  enterprising  and  ex- 
ploring traveller,  who  desires  to  make  a  reputation  for 
himself  by  his  explorations,  his  case  is  even  worse. 
Kafiristan,  Chinese  Tibet,  and  the  very  centre  of  Africa, 
indeed  remain  for  him  ;  but,  wherever  he  may  go,  he 
cannot  escape  the  painful  conviction  that  his  task  will 
ere  long  be  trodden  ground,  and  that  the  special  corre- 
spondent, the  trained  reporter,  will  soon  try  to  obliterate 
his  footsteps.  It  was  not  so  in  older  times.  The  man 
who  went  out  to  see  a  strange  country,  if  he  were  for- 
tunate enough  to  return  to  his  friends  alive,  became 
an  authority  on  that  country  to  the  day  of  his  death, 

A 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


and  continued  so  for  generations  afterwards,  if  he  had 
only  used  his  wits  well.  An  accurate  description  of  a 
country  usually  stood  good  for  a  century  or  two,  at 
least,  and  for  that  period  there  was  no  one  to  dispute  it ; 
but  the  Khiva  of  1872  is  fundamentally  different  from 
the  Khiva  of  1874;  and  could  we  stand  to-day  where 
Speke  stood  sublimely  alone  a  few  years  ago  at  Mur- 
chison  Falls,  when  he  was  accomplishing  the  heroic 
feat  of  passing  (for  the  first  time  in  authentic  history) 
from  Zanzibar  to  Cairo,  through  the  ground  where  the 
Nile  unquestionably  takes  its  rise,  we  should  probably 
see  an  English  steamboat,  with  Colonel  Gordon  on 
board,  moving  over  the  waters  of  Lake  Victoria  Nyanza. 
For  the  change  in  the  relations  of  one  country  with 
another,  which  has  been  effected  by  steam  as  a  means 
of  propulsion,  is  of  a  most  radical  kind  ;  and  it  proceeds 
so  rapidly,  that  by  the  time  the  little  girls  at  our  knees 
are  grandmothers,  and  have  been  fired  with  that  noble 
ambition  to  see  the  world  which  possesses  the  old  ladies 
of  our  own  day,  it  will  be  only  a  question  of  money  and 
choice  with  them,  as  to  having  a  cruise  upon  the  lakes 
of  Central  Africa,  or  going  to  reason  with  the  Grand 
Lama  of  Tibet  upon  the  subject  of  polyandry.  Any 
one  walking  along  the  Strand  may  notice  advertise- 
ments of  "  Gaze's  annual  tour  to  Jerusalem,  Damascus, 
Nineveh,  Babylon,  the  Garden  of  Eden,"  &c,  &c.  No 
doubt  that  sort  of  thing  will  receive  a  check  occasion- 
ally ;  there  has  been  a  refreshing  recurrence,  within  the 
last  two  months,  of  brigandage  in  Sicily  and  the  Italian 
peninsula,  which  may  serve  to  create  a  vacuum  for  the 
meditative  traveller;  and  if  a  party  of  Cook's  tourists 
were  to  fall  into  the  hands  of  Persian  or  Kurdish 
banditti,  the  unspeakable  consequences  would  probably 
put  a  stop  to  excursions  to  the  Garden  of  Eden  for 
some   time   to   come ;   but  still   the    process    would    go 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS. 


on,  of  bringing  together  the  ends  of  the  earth,  and  of 
making  the  remotest  countries  familiar  ground. 

Such  a  process,  however,  will  always  leave  room  for 
books  of  travel  by  the  few  who  are  specially  qualified 
either  to  understand  nature  or  describe  mankind  ;  and 
there  are  regions  of  the  world,  the  natural  conformation 
of  which  will  continue  to  exclude  ordinary  travellers, 
until  we  have  overcome  the  difficulty  of  flying  through 
the  air.  Especially  are  such  regions  to  be  found  in  the 
Himaliya — which,  according  to  the  Sanscrit,  literally 
means  "  The  Abode  of  Snow  " — and  indeed  in  the  whole 
of  that  enormous  mass  of  mountains  which  really 
stretches  across  Asia  and  Europe,  from  the  China  Sea 
to  the  Atlantic,  and  to  which  Arab  geographers  have 
given  the  expressive  title  of  "The  Stony  Girdle  of  the 
Earth."  It  is  to  the  loftiest  valleys,  and  almost  the 
highest  peaks  of  that  range  that,  in  this  and  two  or 
three  succeeding  chapters,  I  would  conduct  my  readers 
from  the  burning  plains  of  India,  in  the  hope  of  finding 
themes  of  interest,  if  not  many  matters  of  absolute 
novelty.  I  have  had  the  privilege  of  discoursing  from 
and  on  many  mountains  —  mountains  in  Switzerland 
and  Beloochistan,  China  and  Japan — and  would  now 
speak 

"  Of  vales  more  wild  and  mountains  more  sublime." 

Often,  of  late  years,  when  thinking  of  again  writing 
and  describing  new  scenes,  the  lines  have  recurrred 
to  me  with  painful  force,  which  the  dying  Magician 
of  the  North  wrote  in  pencil  by  Tweedside — 

"  How  shall  the  warped  and  broken  board 
Endure  to  bear  the  painter's  dye? 
The  harp  with  strained  and  tuneless  chord, 
How  to  the  minstrel's  skill  reply?" 

But  the  grandest  mountains  of  the  world,  which  have 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


restored  something  of  former  strength,  may  perhaps 
suggest  thoughts  of  interest,  despite  the  past  death- 
in-life  of  an  invalid  in  the  tropics.  There  is  a  lily  {F. 
cordatd)  which  rarely  blossoms  in  India,  unless  watered 
with  ice-water,  which  restores  its  vigour,  and  makes  it 
flower.  So  the  Englishman,  whose  frame  withers  and 
strength  departs  in  the  golden  sunlight  but  oppressive 
air  of  India,  finds  new  vigour  and  fresh  thought  and 
feeling  among  the  snows  and  glaciers  of  the  Himaliya. 
If  the  reader  will  come  with  me  there,  and  rest  under 
the  lofty  deodar-tree,  I  promise  him  he  will  find  no 
enemy  but  winter  and  rough  weather,  and  perhaps  we 
may  discourse  not  altogether  unprofitably  under  the 
shadow  of  those  lofty  snowy  peaks,  which  still  continue 

"By  the  flight 
Of  sad  mortality's  earth-sullying  wing, 
Unswept,  unstained." 

The  change  in  modern  travel  has  brought  the  most 
interesting,  and  even  the  wildest,  parts  of  India  within 
easy  reach  for  our  countrymen.  Bishop  Heber  mentions 
in  his  Journal  that  he  knew. of  only  two  Englishmen — 
Lord  Valencia  and  Mr  Hyde — who  had  visited  India 
from  motives  of  science  or  curiosity  since  the  country 
came  into  our  possession.  Even  thirty  years  ago  such 
visits  were  unknown  ;  and  the  present  Lord  Derby  was 
about  the  first  young  Englishman  who  made  our  Indian 
Empire  a  part  of  the  grand  tour.  Nowadays,  old  ladies 
of  seventy,  who  had  scarcely  ever  left  Britain  before, 
are  to  be  met  with  on  the  spurs  of  the  Himaliya  ;  and 
we  are  conveyed  rapidly  and  easily  over  vast  stretches 
of  burning  land,  which,  a  few  years  ago,  presented  for- 
midable obstacles  to  even  the  most  eager  traveller.  On 
the  great  routes  over  the  vast  plains  of  Hindusthan 
there  is  no  necessity  now  for  riding  twenty  miles  a  day 
from  bungalow  to  bungalow,  or  rolling  tediously  in  a 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  5 

"palki  gharri"  over  the  interminable  Grand  Trunk  Road. 
Even  in  a  well-cushioned  comfortable  railway  apartment 
it  is  somewhat  trying  to  shoot  through  the  blinding  sun- 
light and  golden  dust  of  an  Indian  plain  ;  and  knowing 
ones  are  to  be  seen  in  such  circumstances  expending 
their  ice  and  soda-water  upon  the  towels  which  they 
have  wrapped  round  their  heads.  But  we  are  compelled 
to  have  recourse  to  such  measures  only  in  the  trying 
transition  periods  between  the  hot  and  cold  seasons  ; 
because,  when  the  heat  is  at  its  greatest,  artificially- 
cooled  carriages  are  provided  for  first-class  passengers. 
Three  days  from  Bombay  and  twenty  pounds  convey- 
ance expenses  will  land  the  traveller  at  Masuri  (Mus- 
sooree),*  on  the  outer  range  of  the  Himaliya;  and  yet, 
if  he  chooses  to  halt  at  various  places  by  the  way, 
a  single  step  almost  will  take  him  into  some  of  the 
wildest  jungle  and  mountain  scenery  of  India,  among 


*  The  spelling  of  Indian  names  is  at  present  in  a  transition  state,  though 
SO  much  has  been  done  to  reduce  it  to  one  common  standard  that  it  is 
expedient  to  follow  that  standard  now,  which  is  the  official  system  of  spell- 
ing adopted  by  the  Indian  Government,  and  usually  followed  by  Dr  Keith 
Johnston  in  his  valuable  maps.  That  system  partakes  of  the  nature  of  a 
compromise,  for  accents  are  only  used  when  specially  necessary  ;  and  in 
the  lists  drawn  up  by  Dr  W.  W.  Hunter  they  are  used  very  sparingly,  and 
are  omitted  in  some  cases  where  they  might  have  been  added  with  advan- 
tage. I  have  followed  these  official  lists  in  almost  every  instance,  except  in 
using  the  word  "  Himaliya  ;"  and  the  simple  rules  to  be  borne  in  mind  in 
order  to  render  their  system  of  spelling  intelligible  are  that — 

1.  The  long  d  sounds  broadly,  as  in  almond. 

2.  The  short  a  without  an  accent,  has  usually  somewhat  of  a  U  sound, 
as  the  <7  in  rural. 

3.  The  I  with  an  accent  is  like  «•,  or  the  i  in  ravine. 

4.  The  11  with  an  accent  is  like  00,  or  the  u  in  bull. 

5.  The  e  has  a  broad  sound,  as  the  a  in  dare. 

6.  The  o  sounds  openly  as  in  note. 

7.  The  at  sounds  as  in  aisle,  or  the  i  in  high. 

8.  The  au  sounds  like  ou  in  cloud. 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


the  most  primitive  tribes,  and  to  the  haunts  of  wild  ani- 
mals of  the  most  unamiable  kind.  Had  the  Bishop- 
poet  lived  now,  he  might  have  sung,  with  much  more 
truth  than  he  did  fifty  years  ago — 

"  Thy  towers,  they  say,  gleam  fair,  Bombay, 
Across  the"  dark-blue  sea  ;" 

for  the  schemes  of  Sir  Bartle  Frere,  energetically  car- 
ried out  by  his  successor,  Sir  Seymour  Fitzgerald,  have 
given  that  city  the  most  imposing  public  buildings  to  be 
found  in  the  East — if  we  except  some  of  the  Moham- 
medan mosques,  with  the  palaces  and  tombs  (for  these, 
too,  are  public  buildings)  of  the  Mogul  Emperors — and  in 
other  ways,  also,  have  made  it  worthy  of  its  natural 
^situation,  and  a  splendid  gate  of  entrance  to  our  Indian 
Empire.  But  half-Europeanised  as  the  capital  of  Wes- 
tern India  is,  within  ten  miles  of  it,  in  the  island  of  Sal- 
sette,  at  the  little-visited  Buddhist  caves  of  Kanhari,  the 
traveller  will  find  not  only  a  long  series  of  ancient  richly- 
sculptured  cave-temples  and  monastic  retreats,  but  also 
the  most  savage  specimens  of  animal  and  vegetable  life, 
in  a  thick  jungle  which  often  seems  alive  with  monkeys, 
and  where,  if  he  only  remains  over  night,  he  would  have 
a  very  good  chance  of  attracting  the  attention  of  the 
most  ferocious  denizen  of  the  Indian  forest.  Though  the 
locomotive  bears  him  swiftly  and  smoothly  up  the  in- 
clines of  the  Thull  Ghaut,  instead  of  his  having  to  cross 
the  Sahyadri  range  by  a  bridle-path,  or  be  dragged 
painfully  by  tortured  bullocks  at  the  rate  of  half  a  mile 
an  hour,  as  was  the  case  only  a  few  years  ago;  yet  he 
has  only  to  stop  at  the  picturesquely-situated  bungalow 
at  Egutpoora,  and  wander  a  little  way  along  the  edge  of 
the  great  bounding  wall  of  the  Deccan,  in  order  to  look 
down  immense  precipices  of  columnar  basalt,  and  see 
huge  rock-snakes  sunning  themselves  upon  the  bastions 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS. 


of  old  Maratha  forts,  and  be  startled  by  the  booming  cry 
of  the  Entellus  monkey,  or  by  coming  on  the  footprints  of 
a  leopard  or  a  tiger.  And  it  may  not  be  amiss,  when 
writing  of  the  Western  Ghauts,  to  point  out  the  remark- 
able parallelism,  which  has  not  before  been  noted, 
between  these  mountains  and  the  Himaliya,  for  it  may 
serve  to  make  the  contour  of  both  ranges  easily  intel- 
ligible. Both  are  immense  bounding  walls  ;  the  one  to 
the  elevated  plains  of  the  Deccan,  and  the  other  to  the 
still  more  elevated  tableland  of  Central  Asia.  Carry- 
ing out  this  parallel,  the  Narbada  (Nerbudda)  will  be 
found  to  occupy  very  much  the  same  position  as  the 
Indus,  the  Sutlej  as  the  Tapti,  and  the  Godaveri  as  the 
Brahmaputra.  All  have  their  rise  high  up  on  their 
respective  tablelands  ;  some  branches  of  the  Godaveri 
rise  close  to  the  sources  of  the  Narbada,  just  as  the  Indus 
and  the  Brahmaputra  have  their  origin  somewhere  about 
Lake  Manasarowar  ;  and  yet  the  former  rivers  fall  into 
the  sea  on  opposite  sides  of  the  Indian  peninsula,  just  as 
the  two  latter  do.  So,  in  like  manner,  the  Tapti  has  its 
origin  near  that  of  the  Narbada,  as  the  Sutlej  rises 
close  to  the  Indus  ;  and  if  we  can  trust  the  Sind  tradi- 
tion, which  represents  the  upper  part  of  the  Arabian  Sea 
as  having  once  been,  dry  land,  there  may  have  been 
a  time  within  the  human  era  when  the  Tapti  flowed  into 
the  Narbada,  as  the  Sutlej  does  into  the  Indus  some  way 
above  the  sea.  There  is  no  mountain  group  in  the  High- 
lands of  Central  India  where  the  three  southern  rivers 
rise  quite  so  close  together  as  do  the  three  northern 
rivers  from  the  lofty  and  inaccessible  Tibetan  Kailas,  but 
still  there  is  a  great  similarity  in  their  relative  positions  ; 
and  it  is  only  when  we  think  of  the  Sahyadri  and  Hima- 
liya as  boundary  walls  that  we  can  understand  their 
relations  to  the  tableland  behind  them,  and  their  terrific 
fall  to  the  low-lying  land  in  front. 


8  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

But  there  is  no  snow  on  the  Sahyadri  mountains,  so 
we  must  hurry  on  past  Nasik,  where  there  is  a  holy  city 
scarcely  less  sacred  than  Benares  in  the  estimation  of 
the  Hindus  ;  so  holy  is  it,  that  the  mere  mention  of  the 
river  on  which  it  stands  is  supposed  to  procure  the  for- 
giveness of  sins  ;  and  the  banks  of  this  river  are  covered 
by  as  picturesque  ghauts  and   temples  as  those  of  the 
Gangetic    city.     No   traveller  should   omit   stopping  at 
Nandgaum,  in  order  to  pay  a  visit  to  the  immense  series 
of  carved  hills,  of  rock-temples   and  sculptured  caves, 
which  make  Ellora  by  far  the  most  wonderful  and  instruc- 
tive place  in  India.     If  we  have  to  diverge  from  the  rail- 
way line  again  into  the  upper  Tapti  valley,  we  shall  find 
that  the  basins  of  rich  and  once  cultivated  soil  are  covered 
by  dense  jungle  of  grass  and  bamboo,  full  of  tiger,  bear, 
bison,  sambar  and  spotted  deer,  and  inhabited,  here  and 
there,  by  Kurkies  an.d  other  aboriginal  tribes,  but  having 
a  deadly  climate  during  great  part  of  the   year.     Ap- 
proaching Khandwa  on  the  railway,  we  see  the  ancient 
and  famous  fort  of  Asirghar  in  the  distance,  rising  850 
feet  above  the  plain,  and  23CO  feet  above  the  sea;  and 
Khandwa  itself,  which  has  been  built  with  the  stones 
from  an  old  Jain  town,  is  important  now  as  a  place  where 
the  whole  traffic  of  Central  India  to  Bombay  meets,  and 
as  one  terminus  of  a  branch  line  of  rail  which  takes  into 
the  great  native  state  of  India,  and  the  capital  of  the 
famous  Holkar.     I  lore  we  enter  into  the  Narbada  valley, 
and  are  soon  between  two  notable  ranges  of  mountains, 
the  Satpura  and  the  Vindhya.     Ten  years  ago  the  Cen- 
tral Provinces  were  described  as  "  for  the  most  part  a 
terra  incognita;  "  and,  though  now  well  known,  the  High- 
lands of  Central  India  present  abundance  of  the  densest 
jungle,  full  of  the  wildest  animals  and  the  most  primitive 
cf  men.      In  the  early  dawn,  as  the  railway  train  rushes 
along  through  the  cool  but  mild  air,  are  seen  to  the  right 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS. 


an  irregular  line  of  picturesque  mountains  covered  with 
thick  jungle  to  their  summits  ;  and  the  Englishman  unac- 
customed to  India,  who  leaves  the  railway  and  goes  into 
them,  will  find  himself  as  much  out  of  his  reckoning  as 
if  he  threw  himself  overboard  a  Red  Sea  steamer  and 
made  for  the  Arabian  coast.  The  Narbada,  which  is  the 
boundary  between  the  Deccan  and  Hindusthan  proper, 
rises  at  Amartank,  at  the  height  of  5000  feet,  in  the 
dominions  of  the  painted  Rajah  of  Rewa,  who  was  cer- 
tainly the  most  picturesque  figure  in  the  great  Bombay 
durbar  two  years  ago.  It  enters  the  Gulf  of  Bombay  at 
the  cotton  town  of  Bharuch  or  Broach,  and  to  the  Eng- 
lish merchant  is  almost  the  most  important  of  the  Indian 
rivers.  It  is  supposed  that,  in  prehistoric  times,  its  valley 
must  have  been  a  series  of  great  lakes,  which  are  now 
filled  by  alluvial  deposits  of  a  recent  epoch  ;  and  the 
discovery  of  flint  implements  in  its  alluvium,  by  the  late 
Lieutenant  Downing  Sweeney,  has  indicated  it  as  an 
important  field  for  the  researches  of  the  archaeologist. 
Though  its  upper  course  is  tumultuous  enough,  in  deep 
clefts  through  marble  rock,  and  falling  in  cascades  over 
high  ledges,  it  soon  reaches  a  rich  broad  valley,  con- 
taining iron  and  coal,  which  is  one  of  the  largest  grana- 
ries, and  is  the  greatest  cotton  field  of  India.  Through 
that  valley  it  runs,  a  broad  yellow  strip  of  sand  and 
shingle  ;  and  it  has  altogether  a  course  of  about  800 
miles,  chiefly  on  a  basalt  bed,  through  a  series  of  rocky 
clefts  and  valley  basins. 

If  the  traveller  has  come  straight  from  Bombay,  he 
will  feel  inclined  to  halt  at  Jabalpur  (Jubbulpore)  after 
his  ride  of  twenty-six  hours  ;  but  if  his  stay  there  be 
only  for  a  day,  he  will  do  well,  after  seeing  the  novelty 
of  a  Thug  school  of  industry,  to  hire  a  horse-carriage, 
and  drive  on  about  ten  miles  to  the  famous  and  won- 
derful Marble  Rocks,  where  he  will  find  a  beautifully- 


io  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

situated  bungalow  for  travellers,  and  an  old  but  by  no 
means  worn-out  Kharisamah,  who  will  cook  for  him  a 
less  pretentious,  but  probably  as  good  a  dinner  as  he 
would  find  in  the  hotels  of  Jabalpur.  The  place  I 
speak  of  presents  one  of  those  enchanting  scenes 
which  remain  for  ever  vivid  in  the  memory.  The 
Narbada  there  becomes  pent  up  among  rocks,  and 
falls  over  a  ledge  about  thirty  feet  high,  and  then 
flows  for  about  two  miles  through  a  deep  chasm  below 
the  surface  of  the  surrounding  country,  cut  through 
basalt  and  marble,  but  chiefly  through  the  latter. 
The  stream  above  its  fall  has  a  breadth  of  ICO  yards,  but 
in  the  chasm  of  only  about  20  yards  ;  and  the  giittering 
cliffs  of  white  marble  which  rise  above  it  are  from  80  to 
120  feet  high,  and  are  composed  of  a  dolomite  and 
magnesian  limestone.  Such,  briefly  stated,  are  the  con- 
stituents of  the  scene,  but  they  are  insufficient  to  explain 
its  weird  charm.  I  went  up  between  the  Marble  Rocks 
in  the  early  morning  in  a  boat,  by  moonlight,  and  floated 
down  in  sunlight ;  and  as  we  moved  slowly  up  that 
romantic  chasm,  the  drip  of  water  from  the  paddles,  and 
the  wash  of  the  stream,  only  showed  how  deep  the  silence 
was.  A  tiger  had  been  doing  some  devastation  in  the 
neighbourhood,  and  one  of  the  boatmen  whispered  that 
we  might  have  a  chance  of  seeing  it  come  down  to  drink 
at  the  entrance  of  the  cleft,  or  moving  along  the  rocks 
above,  which  of  course  made  the  position  more  interest- 
ing. The  marble  walls  on  one  side,  which  sparkled  like 
silver  in  the  moonlight,  reflected  so  white  a  radiance  as 
almost  to  illumine  the  shadow  of  the  opposite  cliffs  ; 
but  the  stream  itself  lay  in  deeper  shadow,  with  here 
and  there  shafts  of  dazzling  light  falling  upon  it;  and 
above,  the  moonbeams  had  woven  in  the  air  a  silvery 
veil,  through  which  even  the  largest  stars  shone  only 
dimly.     It  did  not  look  at  all  like  a  scene  on  earth,  but 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS. 


rather  as  if  we  were  entering  the  portals  of  another  world. 
Coming  down  in  the  brilliant  sunlight,  the  chasm  ap- 
peared less  weird  but  hardly  less  extraordinary.  Large 
fish  began  to  leap  at  the  dragon-flies  which  skimmed 
over  the  surface  of  the  water ;  monkeys  ran  along  the 
banks  above,  and  chattered  angrily  at  us  ;  many  pea- 
cocks also  appeared  above,  uttering  their  harsh  cries; 
and  the  large  bees'  nests  which  hung  every  here  and 
there  from  the  Marble  Rocks,  began  to  show  unpleasant 
symptoms  of  life.  Let  every  visitor  to  this  place  beware 
how  he  disturbs  these  ferocious  and  reckless  insects. 
They  are  very  large;  their  sting  is  very  poisonous,  and 
they  display  a  fury  and  determination  in  resenting  any 
interference,  which  makes  them  most  formidable  enemies. 
Two  Englishmen,  I  was  told,  were  once  floating  through 
the  chasm,  when  a  ball,  which  one  of  them  had  fired  at 
a  peacock,  slanted  off  from  the  rock  and  unfortunately 
happened  to  hit  one  of  these  nests.  The  consequence 
was,  that  the  bees  immediately  swarmed  about  the  boat, 
and  stung  one  of  its  occupants,  who  was  unable  to  swim, 
so  severely  that  he  died  from  the  effects.  His  com- 
panion leaped  into  the  stream  and  floated  down  with  it; 
but  even  then  a  cloud  of  bees  followed  him  for  a  long 
way,  watching  his  movements,  and  immediately  attacked 
his  face  and  every  portion  of  his  body  which  appeared 
for  an  instant  above  the  surface  of  the  water. 

Allahabad,  the  capital  of  the  North-West  Provinces, 
has  become  one  of  the  most  important  places  in  India 
from  its  position  at  the  junction  of  two  mighty  rivers, 
and  as  the  centre  of  the  railway  communication  between 
Bombay,  Calcutta,  and  the  Panjab.  It  possesses  a  news- 
paper, the  Pioneer,  which  obtained  great  popularity  all 
over  India  from  the  humour  of  its  late  editor,  the  Rev. 
Julian  Robinson  ;  and  while  its  past  is  interesting  from 
its  connection  with  the  Indian  Mutiny  and  the  stemming 


12  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

of  the  tide  of  mutiny,  the  archaeologist  will  find  in  it 
remains  which  are  of  great  importance  for  the  elucida- 
tion of  Indian  antiquity.  English  travellers  will  also 
find  there  the  residence  of  the  cotton  commissioner,  Mr 
Rivett-Carnac,  who  is  so  well  known  by  his  great  efforts 
to  enable  India  to  meet  the  demands  of  Great  Britain  for 
its  products,  by  his  activity  in  collecting  information 
of  all  kinds,  and  his  extreme  readiness  in  imparting  it  to 
those  who  are  happy  enough  to  come  in  contact  with  him. 
But  we  must  proceed  towards  the  Himaliva;  and  in 
order  to  do  so  at  once,  I  shall  say  nothing  here  of  Cawn- 
pore  and  Lucknow,*  Delhi  and  Agra.  They  have  been 
admirably  described  by  several  modern  writers,  but  no 
description  can  give  an  adequate  idea  of  the  mournful 
interest  excited  by  a  visit  to  the  two  former,  or  of  the 
dazzling  beauty  of  the  Taj  Mahal  and  the  Pearl  Mosque 
of  Agra.  I  shall  only  remark,  that  those  who  visit  the 
scenes  of  the  Indian  Mutiny  may  do  well  to  inquire  for 
themselves  into  the  true  history  of  that  dreadful  out- 
break, and  not  allow  themselves  to  be  deceived  by  the 
palliating  veil  which  such  amiable  writers  as  the  late  Dr 
Norman  Macleod  have  drawn  over  it.  That  history 
has  never  been  written ;  and  I  was  assured  by  one  of 
the  special  commissioners  who  went  up  with  the  first 
relieving  force  from  Allahabad,  that  the  Government 
interfered  to  prevent  his  publishing  an  account  of  it, 
drawn  from  the  sworn  depositions  which  had  been  made 
before  him.  It  is  right  that  the  Angel  of  Mercy  should 
bend  over  the  well  at  Cawnpore,  and  flowers  spring 
from  the  shattered  walls  of  the  Residency  at  Lucknow; 
but  the  lessons  of  the  Mutiny  are  likely  to  be  in  great 
part  lost,  if  its  unprovoked  atrocities  are  to  be  concealed 

*  These  are  two  nnmes,  the  spelling  of  which  should  have  been  left  un- 
altered, even  according  to  the  Government's  own  views. 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  13 

in  the  darkness  to  which  every  humane  heart  must  desire 
to  relegate  them. 

Here,  in  the  valley  of  the  Ganges,  we  may  be  said  to 
be  at  the  base  of  the  Himaliya,  though  even  from  near 
points  of  view  they  are  not  visible  through  the  golden- 
dust  haze  of  an  Indian  March.  This  valley  runs  parallel 
with  the  Stony  Girdle  for  1200  miles,  itself  varying  from 
80  miles  in  breadth  at  Monghir  to  200  at  Agra,  and  is 
so  flat  as  to  suggest  rather  an  immensely  long  strip  of 
plain  than  anything  like  a  valley.  Those  who  do  not 
think  of  venturing  into  the  high  and  interior  Himaliya, 
but  yet  wish  to  have  something  like  a  near  view  of  the 
highest  and  grandest  mountains  in  the  world,  will  of 
course  direct  their  steps  to  one  or  more  of  the  hill- 
stations  on  its  southern  or  south-western  front,  and  each 
of  the  more  important  of  these  is  a  place  of  departure 
for  the  wilder  and  more  inaccessible  country  behind. 
A  brief  glance  at  these  latter  will  serve  to  expose  the 
points  from  which  the  most  interesting  parts  of  the 
Himaliya  are  accessible. 

To  begin  from  the  east,  Darjiling  (Darjeeling)  is  the 
great  sanitarium  for  Bengal,  and  is  usually  the  residence, 
for  some  portion  of  the  year,  of  the  Lieutenant-Governor 
of  that  province,  and  of  his  chief  officers.  A  railway  is 
in  course  of  construction,  or  is  to  be  constructed,  which 
will  greatly  facilitate  access  to  it.  As  it  is,  we  have  to 
go  eleven  hours  by  rail  from  Calcutta,  four  hours  in  a 
river  steamboat,  124  miles  in  a  dak  gharri,  bullock  shig- 
ram,  or  mail-cart,  then  fourteen  miles  on  horseback,  or 
in  a  palanquin  to  the  foot  of  the  hills,  and  by  similar 
means  of  carriage  up  to  the  top  of  them,  in  order  to 
reach  Darjiling.  In  the  rains  this  is  a  horrible  journey 
to  make ;  and,  except  in  the  very  hot  season,  the 
miasma  of  the  Terai,  or  jungle  forest  between  Siligari 
and  Pankabarri,  is  so  deadly  that  the  traveller  is  always 


14  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO  W. 

advised  to  pass  it  by  daylight — a  proposal  which  iri  all 
probability  he  will  be  glad  to  accede  to,  unless  familiarity 
with  tigers  and  wild  elephants  has  bred  in  him  a  due 
contempt  for  such  road-fellows.  This  makes  Darjiling 
not  a  very  easy  place  to  get  at,  and  it  has  the  additional 
disadvantage  of  being  exceedingly  wet  and  cold  during 
the  south-west  monsoon — that  is  to  say,  from  any  time 
in  the  end  of  June  till  the  beginning  of  October  ;  but, 
notwithstanding  these  drawbacks,  it  recommends  itself 
to  the  tourist  who  does  not  care  to  attempt  tent-life  in 
the  mountains,  on  account  of  its  magnificent  view  of  the 
Himaliya,  and  its  vicinity  to  the  very  highest  peaks  of 
that  mighty  range.  Gaurisankar,  or  Mount  Everest,  the 
culminating  point  of  the  earth's  surface,  and  which  rises 
to  the  height  of  29,002  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea, 
is  in  Nepal,  and  is  not  visible  from  the  hill-station  we 
speak  of ;  but  it  can  be  seen,  when  weather  allows,  from 
an  elevation  only  a  day  or  two's  journey  from  Darjiling. 
Kanchinjanga  in  Sikkim,  however,  which  is  the  second 
highest  peak  in  the  world,  and  rises  to  the  height  of 
28,150  feet,  is  visible  from  Darjiling;  and  no  general 
view  of  the  Himaliya  is  finer,  more  characteristic,  or 
more  impressive,  than  that  which  we  may  have  from  the 
Cutcherry  hill  at  Darjiling,  looking  over  dark  range 
after  range  of  hills  up  to  the  eternal  snows  of  Kanchin- 
janga, and  the  long  line  of  its  attendant  monarchs  of 
mountains.  Unfortunately,  Gaurisankar,  the  loftiest 
mountain  of  all,  is  out  of  the  reach  of  nearly  all  tra- 
vellers, owing  to  our  weakness  in  allowing  Nepal  to  ex- 
clude Englishmen  from  its  territory  ;  but  if  any  one  is 
very  anxious  to  try  Chinese  Tibet,  he  will  find  one  of 
the  doors  into  it  by  going  up  from  Darjiling  through  the 
protected  state  of  Sikkim  ;  but  whether  the  door  will 
open  at  his  request  is  quite  another  matter,  and  if  he 
kicks  at  it,  he  is  likely  to  find  himself  suddenly  going 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  15 

down  the  mountains  considerably  faster  than  he  went 
up  them.  Verbum  sat  sapientibits ;  but  if  one  could  only 
get  through  this  door,  it  is  a  very  short  way  from  it  to 
Lassa,  the  capital  of  Tibet,  and  the  residence  of  the 
Grand  Lama,  which,  possibly,  is  the  reason  why  it  is 
kept  so  strictly  guarded. 

Gaurisankar,  and  the  highest  peaks  of  the  Himaliya, 
are  on  the  border  between  Nepal  and  Tibet,  and  form  a 
group  somewhat  obtruding  from  the  line  of  the  main 
range.  It  is  provoking  that  the  weak  foreign  policy  of 
the  Indian  Government — a  policy,  however,  which  has 
been  very  much  forced  upon  it  from  home — should 
allow  the  Nepalese  to  exclude  English  travellers  from 
their  territory,  while  at  the  same  time  we  treat  the 
former  as  friendly  allies,  and  heap  honours  upon  Jung 
Bahadur.  To  take  such  a  line  is  always  regarded  in  the 
East  as  a  proof  of  weakness,  which  indeed  it  is  ;  and  the 
best  commentary  upon  its  effects  is  the  belief,  every- 
where prevalent  in  India,  that  the  Nana  Sahib  is,  or  for 
long  has  been,  the  protected  guest  of  the  Court  of  Kat- 
mandu. This  policy  places  about  500  miles  of  the 
Himaliya  out  of  the  reach  of  the  English  traveller, 
though  these  500  miles  contain  the  culminating  point  of 
the  whole  range,  the  most  splendid  jewel  in  the  Stony 
Girdle  of  the  Earth.  There  is  another  stretch  of  500 
miles  to  the  east  of  Nepal,  occupied  by  Bhotan,  in  which 
also  no  European  can  travel,  owing  to  the  character  of 
the  inhabitants  and  of  the  Government ;  so  that  it  is 
only  in  the  little  narrowed  strip  of  Sikkim  that  one  can 
get  up  at  all  to  the  main  range  of  the  eastern  Himaliya ; 
and  thus  we  are  practically  shut  out  from  a  thousand 
miles  of  the  Himaliya — from  a  thousand  miles  of  the 
noblest  mountains  in  the  world,  overlooking  the  Gangetic' 
valley  and  the  conquered  provinces  of  British  India. 
It  follows  from  this,   that  the  traveller  who  wishes  to 


16  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

enter  among'  these  giant  mountains,  and  is  not  content 
with  a  view  of  them,  such  as  we  have  of  the  Oberland 
Alps  from  the  summit  of  the  Righi,  must  of  necessity 
betake  himself  to  the  western  Himaliya.  It  is  true  he 
may  go  up  the  Sikkim  valley  from  Darjiling  to  the  foot 
of  Kanchinjanga,  but  he  is  then  confined  to  the  narrow 
gorges  of  the  Testa  and  the  Ranjit.  Moreover,  it  is  only 
in  summer  that  one  can  travel  among  the  higher  ranges, 
and  in  summer,  Sikkim  is  exposed  to  almost  the  full 
force  of  the  Indian  monsoon,  which  rages  up  to  the 
snows  of  Kanchinjanga  with  a  saturated  atmosphere  and 
the  densest  fogs.  Pedestrianism  and  tent-travelling  in 
such  circumstances  are  almost  out  of  the  question  ;  and 
as  it  is  only  when  the  traveller  can  get  a  snowy  range 
between  himself  and  the  Indian  monsoon  that  he  can 
travel  with  any  comfort,  or  even  with  safety,  among  the 
Himaliya  in  summer,  he  must  perforce  betake  himself  to 
their  western  section,  if  he  desires  to  make  acquaintance 
with  the  interior  and  higher  portions  of  that  mighty 
range. 

Passing,  then,  over  the  500  miles  of  Nepal,  and  casting- 
one  longing  look  in  the  direction  of  Gaurisankar,  we 
come  to  Naini  Tal  or  Nyni  Tal,  which  is  the  sanitarium 
of  the  North-West  Provinces,  as  Darjiling  is  of  Bengal, 
and  is  visited  every  year  by  their  Lieutenant-Governor 
and  a  large  portion  of  Allahabad  society.  It  is  a 
charming  spot,  with  a  beautiful  little  lake  surrounded 
by  wooded  mountains;  but  it  is  not  in  proximity  to  any 
high  peaks,  nor  does  it  command  views  of  the  snowy 
ranges.  It  does  not  afford  easy  access  to  any  of  the 
points  of  special  interest  in  the  higher  mountains,  and 
we  do  not  recommend  the  Himaliyan  tourist  to  pay  it  a 
visit,  for  the  time  which  it  would  occupy  might  be  much 
better  bestowed  in  other  directions  ;  but  it  has  the  ad- 
vantage of  having  two  outposts  of  civilisation  between 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  17 

it  and  the  snowy  mountains, — namely,  Almora,  from 
which  a  long  route  by  the  base  of  Nanda  Kut  (22,536 
feet  high),  will  take  up  to  another  door  into  Chinese 
Tartary — and  Ranikhet,  to  which  the  late  Lord  Mayo 
had  some  thought  of  removing  the  summer  seat  of  the 
supreme  Government  from  Simla,  because  it  has  abun- 
dance of  wood  and  water,  and  is  one  of  the  very  few 
places  in  the  Himaliya  where  there  is  a  little  level 
ground. 

The  next  sanitarium  is  Masuri,  or  Mussooree,  which 
can  be  reached,  through  the  Scwalik  range  and  the 
beautiful  valley  of  the  Dehra  Doon,  in  a  long  day  from 
Saharunpore  on  the  railway.  It  is  not  visited  by  any 
Government  in  particular;  there  is  nobody  to  look  after 
people's  morals  in  that  aerial  retreat ;  and  the  result  is, 
that  though  Masuri  has  much  quiet  family  life,  and  is 
not  much  given  to  balls  or  large  gay  parties,  it  yet  has 
the  character  of  being  the  fastest  of  all  the  hill-stations, 
and  the  one  where  grass  widows  combine  to  allow  them- 
selves the  greatest  liberty.  This  is  scandal,  however — 
not  exact  science ;  and  as  I  have  something  special  to 
say  about  both  Masuri  and  Simla,  I  shall  only  remark 
here  that  they  present  by  far  the  best  points  of  depar- 
ture for  a  tour  in  the  interior  Himaliya;  but  it  should 
be  noted  that  it  is  almost  impossible  to  cross  the  outer 
snowy  range  from  the  former  station  during  July, 
August,  and  September,  when  the  monsoon  is  piling 
snow  upon  it,  and  beneath  the  snow-line  the  rivers  are 
flooded. 

The  younger  hill-stations  of  Dharamsala  and  Dal- 
housie  are  a  long  way  to  the  north-west  of  Simla,  and 
are  so  far  from  the  line  of  railway  to  Lahore  and  from 
any  carriage  roads,  that  they  are  not  likely  to  be  sought, 
in  the  first  instance,  by  any  tourist,  however  enterprising. 
But  it  may  be  remarked  that  they  are  convenient  depots 

B 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


of  the  products  of  civilisation  ;  that  Dalhousie  is  a  good 
starting-point  for  Kashmir,  and  that  Dharamsala,  where 
the  houses  stand  at  elevations  of  from  about  4000  to 
7000  feet  high,  rises  out  of  the  Kangra  valley,  which 
Lord  Canning  held  to  be  the  most  beautiful  district  in 
India,  with  the  exception  of  Kashmir,  and  which  com- 
bines the  advantages  of  tropical  with  Alpine  climate  and 
vegetation.  Very  far  beyond  these,  at  a  height  of  about 
7000  feet,  we  have  Mari  (Muree)  which  is  the  hill-station 
for  the  Panjab  and  its  Lieutenant-Governor,  and  the 
great  point  of  departure  for  Kashmir.  It  is  only  40 
miles  distant  from  the  Grand  Trunk  Road  at  Rawal 
Pindi,  and  can  be  reached  in  hill-carts,  so  that  it  is  really 
more  accessible  to  the  English  tourist  than  some  of  the 
hill-stations  which  geographically  may  appear  much 
nearer  ;  but  it  is  not  in  immediate  proximity  to  any 
very  high  ranges,  though  sometimes  a  glimpse  can  be 
got  from  its  neighbourhood  of  the  wonderful  peak  of 
Nangha  Purbat,  which  is  26,629  feet  high.  Close  to  the 
Indus,  where  the  Himaliya  have  changed  into  the  Hindu 
Kush,  there  is  Abbotabad,  which,  though  a  military 
station,  and  little  over  4000  feet,  is  one  of  the  points 
which  command  Kashmir;  and  it  has  beside  it  the  sani- 
tarium of  Tandali,  or  Tundiani,  which  presents  more 
extensive  views  from  the  height  of  9000  feet.  And  here 
our  line  of  sanitariums  comes  to  an  end  ;  for  though  the 
plain  of  our  trans-Indus  possession  is  bounded  by  the 
most  tempting  mountains,  the  lower  rangesof  the  Hindu 
Kush,  yet  if  the  tourist  makes  even  the  slightest  attempt 
to  scale  these,  he  will  find  that,  between  the  Akoond  of 
Swat,  the  Amir  of  Kaubul,  and  the  officers  of  the  British 
Government,  he  will  have  an  uncommonly  bad  time  of 
it,  and  may  consider  himself  fortunate  if  he  is  only 
brought  back  neck-and-crop  to  Peshawur  (Peshawur) 
and  put  under  surveillance,  or  ordered  out  of  the  district. 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  19 

Simla,  as  I  have  indicated,  is  the  best  starting-point 
for  the  inner  Himaliya,  besides  being  an  interesting 
place  in  itself,  as  usually  the  summer  residence  of  the 
Viceroy  and  the  other  chiefs  of  the  supreme  Government 
of  India,  though  this  year  they  have  been  detained  in 
Calcutta  by  the  Bengal  famine.  But  Masuri  is  more 
easy  of  access ;  that  place,  or  rather  the  closely  adjacent 
military  station  of  Landaur  (Landour),  commands  a 
finer  view  of  snowy  peaks  ;  and  it  is  not  necessary  to 
descend  from  Masuri  to  the  burning  plains  in  order  to 
reach  Simla,  as  a  good  bridle-road,  passing  through  the 
new  military  station  of  Chakraota,  connects  the  two 
places,  and  can  be  traversed  in  fourteen  easy  marches, 
which  afford  very  good  preliminary  experience  for  a 
tour  in  the  Himaliya.  In  April  of  last  year  Masuri  was 
the  first  elevation  I  made  for,  and  eagerly  did  I  seek  its 
cool  breezes  after  the  intense  heat  of  Agra  and  Delhi. 
Anglo-Indians  are  very  hospitable  towards  English  tra- 
vellers; and  as  the  thoughtful  kindness  of  Sir  William 
Muir,  the  then  Lieutenant-Governor  of  the  North- West 
Provinces,  had  furnished  me  with  some  valuable  letters 
of  introduction,  I  could  not  but  accede  to  his  wish  that 
I  should  go  to  Rurki  (Roorkee)  and  see  the  Engineering 
College  there,  the  workshops,  and  the  works  of  the 
Ganges  Canal.  At  Saharunpore,  the  railway  station 
for  Rurki,  there  is  a  botanical  garden,  and  a  valuable  col- 
lection of  fossils,  under  the  charge,  and  created  by  the 
labours,  of  Dr  Jamieson,  of  the  Forest  Department,  a 
relative  and  pupil  of  the  well-known  mineralogist,  and 
one  of  the  founders  of  the  science  of  geology,  who  for 
fifty  years  occupied  the  post  of  Professor  of  Natural 
History  in  the  University  of  Edinburgh.  Of  Rurki 
itself,  and  its  invaluable  canal,  which  has  done  so  much 
to  prevent  famine  in  the  North-West  Provinces,  I  hope 
to  speak  elsewhere.     I  was  fortunate  enough  there  to  be 


20  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

the  guest  of  Major  Lang,  the  very  able  Principal  of  the 
Engineering  College,  who  had  formerly  been  engaged 
in  the  construction  of  "the  great  Hindusthan  and  Tibet 
Road,"  which  runs  from  Simla  towards  Chinese  Tartary  ; 
and  any  doubts  as  to  where  I  was  bound  for  were  soon 
entirely  dissipated  by  the  Principal's  descriptions  of 
Chini  and  Pangay,  the  Indian  Kailas,  and  the  Parang 
La.  He  warned  me,  indeed,  not  to  attempt  Chinese 
Tibet,  lest  the  fate  of  the  unfortunate  Adolph  Schlagint- 
weit  might  befall  me,  and  a  paragraph  should  appear  in 
the  Indian  papers  announcing  that  a  native  traveller 
from  Gartok  had  observed  a  head  adorning  the  pole  of 
a  Tartar's  tent,  which  head,  there  was  only  too  much 
reason  to  fear  from  his  description  of  it,  must  have  been 
that  of  the  enterprising  traveller  who  lately  penetrated 
into  Chinese  Tibet  by  way  of  Shipki.  But  then  it  was 
not  necessary  to  cross  the  border  in  order  to  see  Chini 
and  the  Kailas;  and  even  his  children  kindled  with 
enthusiastic  delight  as  they  cried  out  "  Pangay !  Pan- 
gay!" 

As  the  greatest  mela  or  religious  fair  of  the  Hindus 
was  being  held  at  this  time  at  Hardwar  (Hurdwar), 
where  the  Ganges  is  supposed  to  issue  from  the  Himaliya, 
I  went  over  there  to  see  that  extraordinary  scene,  and 
was  fortunate  enough  to  hit  upon  the  auspicious  day  for 
bathing.  That  also  I  must  leave  undescribed  at  present, 
and  proceed  in  a  dooly  from  Hardwar,  along  a  jungle- 
path  through  the  Terai  to  the  Dehra  Doon  and  Masuri. 
This  was  my  first  experience  of  the  Himaliya.  In  vain 
had  I  strained  my  eyes  to  catch  a  glimpse  of  their  snowy 
summits  through  the  golden  haze  which  filled  the  hot 
air.  Though  visible  from  Riirki,  and  many  other  places 
in  the  plains  at  certain  seasons,  they  are  not  so  in  April ; 
but  here,  at  least,  was  the  outermost  circle  of  them — the 
Terai,  or  literally,  the  "  wet  land,"  the  "  belt  of  death.*' 


TO  THE  H&G&fS.  -  .  21 

■LiASwuS.  . 

the  thick  jungle  swarming  \vit4i  wild  beasts,  which  "runs 


along  their  southern  base.  It: is  not  quite  so  thlc 
deadly  here  between  the  Ganges  and  the  Jumna,  asTifis" 
farther  to  the  east,  on  the  oth|r  side  o|  tliR^^iQfyfiver, 
and  all  the  way  from  the  Ganges  to  tKe  Brahmaputra, 
constituting,  I  suppose,  the  longest  as  well  as  the- 
deadliest  strip  of  jungle-forest  in  the  world.  The 
greater  cold  in  winter  in  this  north-western  portion,  and 
its  greater  distance  from  the  main  range,  prevent  its 
trees  attaining  quite  such  proportions  as  they  do  farther 
east  ;  but  still  it  has  sufficient  heat  and  moisture,  and 
sufficiently  little  circulation  of  air,  to  make  it  even  here 
a  suffocating  hothouse,  into  which  the  wind  does  not 
penetrate  to  dissipate  the  moisture  transpired  by  the 
vegetation  ;  and  where,  besides  the  most  gigantic  Indian 
trees  and  plants — as  the  sissoo,  the  saul  tree,  with  its 
shining  leaves  and  thick  clusters  of  flowers,  and  the 
most  extraordinary  interlacing  of  enormous  creepers — 
we  have,  strange  to  say,  a  number  of  trees  and  other 
plants  properly  belonging  to  far-distant  and  intensely 
tropical  parts  of  the  earth,  such  as  the  Cassia  data  of 
Burmah,  the  Marlea  bcgoniczfolia  of  Java,  the  Ditringia 
celosiocides  of  Papua,  and  the  Neriiun  odorinn  of  Africa. 
This  natural  conservatory  is  a  special  haunt  for  wild 
animals,  and  for  enormous  snakes,  such  as  the  python. 
The  rhinoceros  exists  in  the  Terai,  though  not  beyond 
the  Ganges  ;  but  in  the  part  we  now  are — that  between 
the  Ganges  and  the  Jumna — there  are  wild  elephants, 
and  abundance  of  tiger,  leopard,  panther,  bear,  antelope, 
and  deer  of  various-  kinds.  My  Bombay  servant  had 
heard  so  many  stories  at  Hardwar  about  the  inhabitants 
of  this  jungle,  that  he  entered  into  it  with  fear  and 
trembling.  If  the  word  hatti  (elephant)  was  uttered 
once  by  our  coolies,  it  was  uttered  a  hundred  times  in 
the  course  of  the  morning.     Before  we  had  gone  very 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


far,  my  dooly  was  suddenly  placed  on  the  ground,  and 
my  servants  informed  me  that  there  were  some  wild 
elephants  close  by.  Now,  the  idea  of  being  in  a  canvas 
dooly  when  an  elephant  comes  up  to  trample  on  it,  is 
by  no  means  a  pleasant  one  ;  so  I  gathered  myself  out 
slowly  and  deliberately,  but  with  an  alacrity  which  I 
could  hardly  have  believed  possible.  Surely  enough, 
the  heads  and  backs  of  a  couple  of  large  elephants  were 
visible  in  the  bush  ;  and  as  they  had  no  howdahs  or 
cloths  upon  them,  the  inference  was  fair  that  they  were 
wild  animals.  But  a  little  observation  served  to  show 
that  there  were  men  beside  them.  They  turned  out  to 
be  tame  elephants  belonging  to  a  Mr  Wilson,  a  well- 
known  Himaliyan  character,  who  was  hunting  in  the 
Terai,  and  who  seems  to  have  been  met  by  every  tra- 
veller to  Masuri  for  the  last  twenty  years.  I  did  not  see 
him  at  this  time,  but  afterwards  made  his  acquaintance 
in  the  hotel  at  Masuri,  and  again  in  Bombay.  It  will 
give  some  idea  of  the  abundance  of  game  in  this  part  of 
the  Terai  to  mention,  that  on  this  shooting  excursion, 
which  lasted  only  for  a  very  few  days,  he  bagged  two 
tigers,  besides  wounding  another,  which  was  lost  in  the 
jungle,  three  panthers,  and  about  thirty  deer.  Mr  Wil- 
son has  been  called  the  "  Ranger  of  the  Himaliya,"  and 
his  history  is  a  curious  one.  About  thirty  years  ago  he 
wandered  up  to  these  mountains  on  foot  from  Calcutta 
with  his  gun,  being  a  sort  of  superior  "  European  loafer." 
There  his  skill  as  a  hunter  enabled  him  to  earn  more 
than  a  livelihood,  by  preserving  and  sending  to  Calcutta 
the  skins  of  the  golden  pheasant  and  other  valuable 
birds.  This  traffic  soon  developed  to  such  proportions, 
that  he  employed  many  paJiarries  to  procure  for  him  the 
skins  of  birds  and  animals,  so  that  his  returns  were  not 
solely  dependent  on  the  skill  of  his  own  hand.  He 
married  a  native  mountain  lady,  who  possessed  some 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  23 

land,  a  few  days'  marches  from  Masuri ;  and  finally,  by 
a  fortunate  contract  for  supplying  Indian  railways  with 
sleepers  from  the  woods  of  the  Himaliya,  he  had  made 
so  much  money,  that  it  was  currently  believed  at  Masuri, 
when  I  was  there,  that  he  was  worth  more  than  ^150,000. 
I  was  interested  in  his  account  of  the  passes  leading 
towards  Yarkund  and  Kashmir,  with  some  of  which  he 
had  made  personal  acquaintance.  I  may  mention,  also, 
that  he  spoke  in  very  high  terms  of  the  capacities,  as  an 
explorer,  of  the  late  Mr  Hayward,  the  agent  of  the 
Geographical  Society  of  London,  who  was  cruelly  mur- 
dered on  the  border  of  Yassin,  on  his  way  to  the  Pamir 
Steppe,  the  famous  "  Roof  of  the  World."  It  has  been 
rumoured  that  Mr  Hayward  was  in  the  habit  of  ill- 
treating  the  people  of  the  countries  through  which  he 
passed  ;  but  Mr  Wilson,  who  travelled  with  him  for  some 
time,  and  is  himself  a  great  favourite  with  the  moun- 
taineers, repelled  this  supposition,  and  said  he  had  met 
with  no  one  so  well  fitted  as  this  unfortunate  agent  of 
the  Geographical  Society  for  making  his  way  in  difficult 
countries.  I  do  not  think  that  the  least  importance 
should  be  attached  to  accusations  of  the  kind  which  have 
been  brought  against  Mr  Hayward,  or  rather  against  his 
memory.  The  truth  is,  it  is  so  absolutely  necessary  at 
times  in  High  Asia  to  carry  matters  with  a  high  hand 
— so  necessary  for  the  preservation,  not  only  of  the 
traveller's  own  life,  but  also  of  the  lives  of  his  atten- 
dants— that  there  is  hardly  a  European  traveller  in  that 
region,  against  whom,  if  his  mouth  were  only  closed  with 
the  dust  of  the  grave,  and  there  was  any  reason  for 
getting  up  a  case  against  him,  it  could  not  be  proved,  in 
a  sort  of  way,  that  it  was  his  ill-treatment  of  the  natives 
which  had  led  to  his  being  murdered.  I  am  sure  such  a 
case  could  have  been  made  out  against  myself  on  more 
than  one  occasion ;  and  an  officer  on  the  staff  of  the 


24  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Commander-in-Chief  in  India  told  me,  that  the  people 
of  Spiti  had  complained  to  him,  that  a  Sahib,  who  knew 
neither  Hindusthani  nor  English,  much  less  their  own 
Tibetan  dialect,  had  been  beating  them  because  they 
could  not  understand  him.  Now,  this  Sahib  is  one  of 
the  mildest  and  most  gentlemanly  of  the  members  of  the 
present  Yarkund  Mission,  and  the  cause  of  his  energy  in 
Spiti  was,  that,  shortly  before,  in  Lahoul,  several  of  his 
coolies  had  perished  from  cold,  owing  to  disobedience 
of  his  orders,  and  being  a  humane  man,  he  was  anxious 
to  guard  against  the  recurrence  of  such  an  event.  But 
when  treating  of  Kashmir,  I  shall  speak  more  openly 
about  the  story  of  Hay  ward's  death,  and  only  wish  to 
note  here  the  testimony  in  his  favour  which  was  borne 
by  the  experienced  "  Ranger  of  the  Himaliya,"  who  has 
become  almost  one  in  feeling  with  the  people  among 
whom  he  dwells. 

In  the  centre  of  this  Terai,  there  is  an  expensively- 
built  police  chowkie,  in  which  I  took  refuge  from  the 
extreme  heat  of  the  day  ;  but  what  police  have  to  do 
there,  unless  to  apprehend  tigers,  does  not  appear  at 
first  sight.  It  is  quite  conceivable,  however,  that  the 
conservatory  might  become  a  convenient  place  of  refuge 
for  wild  and  lawless  men,  as  well  as  for  wild  plants  and 
wild  beasts.  Hence  the  presence  in  its  midst  of  these 
representatives  of  law  and  order,  who  hailed  the  visit 
of  a  Sahib  with  genuine  delight.  The  delay  here  pre- 
vented me  reaching  the  cultivated  valley  of  the  Dehra 
Doon  till  midnight,  so  torches  were  lit  long  before  we 
left  the  thicker  part  of  the  Terai ;  their  red  light  made 
the  wild  jungle  look  wilder  than  ever,  and  it  was  with  a 
feeling  of  relief  that  we  came  upon  the  first  gardens  and 
tea  plantations.  There  is  no  place  in  India,  unless  per- 
haps the  plateaus  of  the  Blue  Mountains,  which  remind 
one  so  much  of  England  as  the  little  valley  of  the  Dehra 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  25 

Doon  ;  and  Sir  George  Campbell  has  well  observed  that 
no  district  has  been  so  happily  designed  by  nature  for 
the  capital  of  an  Anglo-Indian  empire.  It  lies  between 
the  Sewalik  or  sub-Himaliyan  range  and  the  Himaliya 
itself.  This  former  low  line  of  hills,  which  is  composed 
from  the  debris  of  the  greater  range,  has  its  strata  dip- 
ping towards  the  latter  in  a  north-easterly  direction,  and 
consists  of  a  few  parallel  ridges  which  are  high  towards 
the  plains,  but  sloping  in  the  direction  of  the  Himaliya 
where  there  is  any  interval  between.  It  contains  an 
immense  collection  of  the  fossil  bones  of  the  horse,  bear, 
camel,  hyena,  ape,  rhinoceros,  elephant,  crocodile,  hippo- 
potamus, and  also  of  the  sivatherium,  the  megatherium, 
and  other  enormous  animals  not  now  found  alive.  At 
some  places  it  rests  upon  the  Himaliya,  and  at  others  is 
separated  from  them  by  raised  valleys.  The  Dehra 
Doon  is  one  of  those  elevated  valleys,  with  the  Upper 
Ganges  and  Jumna  flowing  through  it  on  opposite  sides, 
and  is  about  seventy  miles  in  length  and  nearly  twenty 
in  breadth.  It  is  sometimes  spoken  of  by  enthusiasts 
for  colonisation  in  India,  as  if  the  whole  Anglo-Saxon 
race  might  find  room  to  establish  themselves  there  ;  but 
it  is  really  a  very  small  district,  with  almost  all  the  avail- 
able land  occupied  ;  and  from  Masuri  we  see  the  whole 
of  it  lying  at  our  feet  and  bounded  by  the  two  shining 
rivers.  It  is  a  very  pleasant  place,  however.  Being  so 
far  north,  just  about  300  of  latitude,  and  at  an  elevation 
of  a  little  over  20CO  feet,  it  enjoys  a  beautiful  climate. 
Even  in  the  hot  season  the  nights  and  mornings  are 
quite  cool,  which  is  the  great  thing  in  a  hot  country; 
the  fall  of  rain  is  not  so  great  as  in  the  plains  below  or 
in  the  hills  immediately  above  ;  and  in  the  cold  season 
the  temperature  is  delightful,  and  at  times  bracing.  I 
saw  roses  in  the  Dehra  Doon  growing  under  bamboos 
and  mango-trees,  and  beds  of  fine  European  vegetables 


26  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

side  by  side  with  fields  of  the  tea  shrub.  In  one  planta- 
tion which  I  examined  particularly,  the  whole  process 
of  preparing  the  tea  was  shown  to  me.  It  was  under 
the  superintendence  of  a  Celestial,  and  the  process  did 
not  differ  much  from  that  followed  in  China,  but  the 
plants  were  smaller  than  those  usually  seen  in  the 
Flowery  Land.  After  having  been  for  long  a  rather 
unprofitable  speculation,  the  cultivation  of  tea  on  the 
slopes  of  the  Himaliya  is  now  a  decided  monetary  suc- 
cess ;  and  the  only  difficulty  is  to  meet  the  demand  for 
Indian  tea  which  exists  not  only  in  India  and  Europe 
but  also  in  Central  Asia.  Dr  Jamieson  of  Saharunpore, 
who  has  interested  himself  much  in  the  growth  of  tea  in 
India,  and  pressed  it  on  when  almost  everybody  de- 
spaired of  its  ever  coming  to  anything,  was  kind  enough 
to  give  me  a  map  showing  the  tea  districts  of  the  western 
Himaliya  ;  and  I  see  from  it  that  they  begin  close  to  the 
Nepalese  frontier  at  Pethoragurh  in  Kumaon.  A  num- 
ber of  them  are  to  be  found  from  a  little  below  Naini 
Tal  northwards  up  to  Almora  and  Ranikhet.  Besides 
those  in  the  Dehra  Doon,  there  are  some  in  its  neigh- 
bourhood immediately  below  Masuri,  and  to  the  east  of 
that  hill-station.  Next  we  have  those  at  Kalka  on  the 
way  to  Simla  from  Ambala  (Umballa),  at  or  rather  just 
below  Simla  itself,  at  Kotghur  in  the  valley  of  the  Sutlej, 
and  in  the  Kulii  valley,  so  famed  for  the  beauty  and  im- 
morality of  its  women.  And  lastly,  there  is  a  group  at 
Dharamsala,  and  in  the  Kangra  valley  and  its  neighbour- 
hood. The  cultivation  of  tea  does  not  seem  to  get  on 
in  the  Himaliya  above  the  height  of  6coo  feet,  and  it 
flourishes  from  that  height  down  to  about  2000  feet,  or 
perhaps  lower.  Some  people  are  very  fond  of  Indian 
tea,  and  declare  it  to  be  equal,  if  not  superior,  to  that  of 
the  Middle  Kingdom  ;  but  I  do  not  agree  with  them  at 
all.     When  my  supplies  ran  out  in  High  Asia,  tea  was 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  27 

for  some  time  my  only  artificial  beverage,  though  that, 
too,  failed  me  at  last,  and  I  was  obliged  to  have  recourse 
to  roasted  barley,  from  which  really  very  fair  coffee  can 
be  made,  and  coffee  quite  as  good  as  the  liquid  to  be 
had  under  that  name  in  half  the  cafes  of  Europe.  It  is 
in  such  circumstances  that  one  can  really  test  tea,  when 
we  are  so  dependent  on  it  for  its  refreshing  and  invigo- 
rating effects;  and  I  found  that  none  of  the  Indian  tea 
which  I  had  with  me — not  even  that  of  Kangra,  which 
is  the  best  of  all — was  to  be  compared  for  a  moment, 
either  in  its  effects  or  in  the  pleasantness  of  its  taste, 
with  the  tea  of  two  small  packages  from  Canton,  which 
were  given  me  by  a  friend  just  as  I  was  starting  from 
Simla.  The  latter,  as  compared  with  the  Himaliyan 
tea,  was  as  sparkling  hock  to  home-brewed  ale,  and  yet 
it  was  only  a  fair  specimen  of  the  ordinary  better-class 
teas  of  the  Pearl  river. 

Looking  from  Raj  pore  at  the  foot  of  the  hills  up  to 
Masuri,  that  settlement  has  a  very  curious  appearance. 
Many  of  its  houses  are  distinctly  visible  along  the  ridges; 
but  they  are  so  very  high  up,  and  so  immediately  above 
one,  as  to  suggest  that  we  are  in  for  something  like  the 
labours  and  the  experience  of  Jack  on  the  bean-stalk. 
In  the  bazaar  at  Rajpore,  I  was  reminded  of  the  Alps 
by  noticing  several  cases  of  goitre :  and  I  afterwards 
saw  instances  of  this  disease  at  Masuri ;  at  Kalka,  at 
the  foot  of  the  Simla  hills;  at  Simla;  at  Nirth,  a  very 
hot  place  near  Rampur  in  the  Sutlej  valley ;  at  Lippe, 
a  cool  place,  about  9©oo  feet  high,  in  Upper  Kunawur, 
with  abundance  of  good  water;  at  Kaelang  in  Lahoul, 
a  similar  place,  but  still  higher  ;  at  the  Ringdom  Mon- 
astery in  Zanskar,  about  12,000  feet  high;  in  the  great 
open  valley  of  Kashmir;  and  at  Peshawar  in  the  low-lying 
trans-Indus  plains.  These  cases  do  not  all  fit  into  any 
particular  theory  which  has  been  advanced  regarding  the 


28  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

cause  of  this  hideous  disease  ;  and  Dr  Bramley  has  men- 
tioned in  the  Transactions  of  the  Medical  Society  of 
Calcutta,  that  in  Nepal  he  found  goitre  was  more  pre-' 
valent  on  the  crests  of  high  mountains  than  in  the 
valleys.  The  steep  ride  to  Masuri  up  the  vast  masses 
of  mountain,  which  formed  only  the  first  and  compara- 
tively insignificant  spurs  of  the  Himaliya,  gave  a  slight 
foretaste  of  what  is  to  be  experienced  among  their  giant 
central  ranges. 

Masuri,  though  striking  enough,  is  by  no  means  a 
picturesque  place.  It  wants  the  magnificent  deodar  and 
other  trees  of  the  Simla  ridge,  and,  except  from  the 
extreme  end  of  the  settlement,  it  has  no  view  of  the 
Snowy  Mountains,  though  it  affords  a  splendid  outlook 
over  the  Dehra  Doon,  the  Sewaliks,  and  the  Indian 
plains  beyond.  The  "  Himalayan  Hotel"  there  is  the 
best  hotel  I  have  met  with  in  India;  and  there  are  also 
a  club-house  and  a  good  subscription  reading-room  and 
library.  Not  a  few  of  its  English  inhabitants  live  there 
all  the  year  round,  in  houses,  many  of  which  are  placed 
in  little  shelves  scooped  out  of  the  precipitous  sides  of 
the  mountain.  The  ridges  on  which  it  rests  afford  only 
about  five  miles  of  riding-paths  in  all,  and  no  tableland. 
Its  height  is  about  7000  feet — almost  all  the  houses  be- 
ing between  6400  and  72CO  feet  above  the  level  of  the 
sea.  But  this  insures  a  European  climate  ;  for  on  the 
southernjace  of  the  Himaliya  the  average  yearly  temper- 
ature of  London  is  found  at  a  height  of  about  8000  feet. 
The  chief  recommendation  of  Masuri  is  its  equality  of 
temperature,  both  from  summer  to  winter  and  from  day 
to  night ;  and  in  most  other  respects  its  disadvantages  are 
rather  glaring.  In  April,  I  found  the  thermometer  in  a 
shaded  place  in  the  open  air  ranged  from  60°  Fahr.  at 
daybreak,  to  71°  between  two  and  three  o'clock  in  the 
afternoon  ;    and  the  rise  and  fall  of  the  mercury  were 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  29 


very  gradual  and  regular  indeed,  though  there  was  a 
good  deal  of  rain.  The  coldest  month  is  January,  which 
has  a  mean  temperature  of  about  420  45' ;  and  the  hot- 
test is  July,  which  has  6j°  35'.  The  transition  to  the 
rainy  season  appears  to  make  very  little  difference  ;  but 
while  the  months  of  October  and  November  are  delight- 
ful, with  a  clear  and  serene  sky,  and  an  average  tempera- 
ture of  540,  the  rainy  season  must  be  horrible,  exposed 
as  Masuri  is,  without  an  intervening  rock  or  tree,  to  the 
full  force  of  the  Indian  south-west  monsoon.  The  Baron 
Carl  Hiigel  mentions  that  when  he  was  there  in  1835, 
the  rain  lasted  for  eighty-Jive  days,  with  an  intermission 
of  only  a  few  hours.  It  cannot  always  be  so  bad  as  that 
at  Masuri  in  summer,  but  still  the  place  must  be  exceed- 
ingly wet,  cold,  and  disagreeable  during  the  period  of 
the  monsoon  ;  and  it  is  no  wonder  that,  at  such  a  season, 
the  residents  of  the  Dehra  Doon  much  prefer  their 
warmer  and  more  protected  little  valley  below. 

Notwithstanding  the  attractions  of  the  "Himalayan 
Hotel,"  I  would  recommend  the  visitors  to  Masuri  to 
get  out  of  it  as  soon  as  possible,  and  to  follow  the 
example  of  the  American  who  said  to  me  after  forty- 
eight  hours  he  could  stand  it  no  longer,  and  that  he 
wanted  "to  hear  them  panthers  growling  about  my  tent." 
The  two  great  excursions  from  this  place  are  to  the 
Jumnotri  and  the  Gangotri  peaks,  where  the  sacred 
rivers,  Jumna  and  Ganges,  may  be  said  to  take  their  rise 
respectively.  These  journeys  involve  tent-life,  and  the 
usual  concomitants  of  Himaliyan  travel,  but  they  are 
well  worth  making  ;  for  the  southern  side  of  the  sunny 
Himaliya  in  this  neighbourhood  is  grand  indeed.  It  is 
only  fifteen  marches  from  Masuri  to  the  glacier  from 
which  the  Ganges  is  said  to  issue,  though,  in  reality,  a 
branch  of  it  descends  from  much  further  up  among  the 
mountains ;  and  these  marches  are  quite  easy  except  for 


3o  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

nine  miles  near  to  the  glacier,  where  there  is  "a  very 
bad  road  over  ladders,  scaffolds,"  &c.  It  is  of  import- 
ance to  the  tourist  to  bear  in  mind  that,  in  order  to  pur- 
sue his  pleasure  in  the  Himaliya,  it  is  not  necessary  for 
him  to  descend  from  Masuri  to  the  burning  plains.  The 
hill-road  to  Simla  I  have  already  spoken  of.  There  is 
also  a  direct  route  from  Masuri  to  Wangtu  Bridge,  in 
the  Sutlej  valley,  over  the  Burand  Pass,  which  is  15,180 
feet  high,  and  involving  only  two  marches  on  which  there 
are  no  villages  to  afford  supplies.  This  route  to  Wangtu 
Bridge  is  only  fourteen  marches,  and  that  place  is  so 
near  to  Chini  and  the  Indian  Kailas  that  the  tourist 
might  visit  these  latter  in  a  few  days  from  it,  thus  seeing 
some  of  the  finest  scenery  in  the  snowy  Himaliya;  and 
he  could  afterwards  proceed  to  Simla  from  Wangtu  in 
eleven  marches  along  the  cut  portion  of  the  Hindusthan 
and  Tibet  road.  There  is  another  and  still  more  inter- 
esting route  from  Masuri  to  the  valley  of  the  Sutlej  over 
the  Nila  or  Nilung  Pass,  and  then  down  the  wild  Buspa 
valley ;  but  that  pass  is  an  exceedingly  difficult  one,  and 
is  somewhere  about  i8,coo  feet  high,  so  no  one  should 
attempt  it  without  some  previous  experience  of  the  high 
Himaliya  ;  and  it  is  quite  impassable  when  the  monsoon 
is  raging,  as  indeed  the  Burand  Pass  may  be  said  to  be 
also.  The  neophyte  may  also  do  well  to  remember  that 
tigers  go  up  to  the  snow  on  the  south  side  of  the  Hima- 
liya ;  and  that,  at  the  foot  of  the  Jumnotri  and  Gangotri 
peaks,  besides  "  them  panthers,"  and  a  tiger  or  two,  he 
is  likely  enough  to  have  snow-bears  growling  about  his 
tent  at  night. 

I  had  been  unfortunate  in  not  having  obtained  even  a 
single  glimpse  of  the  snowy  Himaliya  from  the  plains, 
or  from  any  point  of  my  journey  to  Masuri,  and  I  learned 
there  that  they  were  only  visible  in  the  early  morning  at 
that  season.     Accordingly  I  ascended  one  morning  at 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  31 

daybreak  to  the  neighbouring  military  station  of  Lan- 
daur,  and  there  saw  these  giant  mountains  for  the  first 
time.  Sir  Alexander  Burnes  wrote  in  his  "  Travels  into 
Bokhara,"  &c. — "I  felt  a  nervous  sensation  of  joy  as  I 
first  gazed  on  the  Himalaya."  When  Bishop  Heber 
saw  them,  he  "  felt  intense  delight  and  awe  in  looking 
on  them."  Even  in  these  anti-enthusiastic  times  I  fancy 
most  people  experience  some  emotion  on  first  beholding 
those  lofty  pinnacles  of  unstained  snow,  among  which 
the  gods  of  Hindusthan  are  believed  to  dwell.  From 
Landaur  a  sea  of  mist  stretched  from  my  feet,  veiling, 
but  not  altogether  conceahng,  ridge  upon  ridge  of  dark 
mountains,  and  even  covering  the  lower  portions  of  the 
distant  great  wall  of  snow.  No  sunlight  as  yet  fell  upon 
this  dark  yet  transparent  mist,  in  which  the  mountainous 
surface  of  the  earth,  with  its  black  abysses,  seemed  sunk 
as  in  a  gloomy  ocean,  bounded  by  a  huge  coral-reef. 
But  above  this,  dazzling  and  glorious  in  the  sunlight, 
high  up  in  the  deep  blue  heavens,  there  rose  a  white 
shining  line  of  gigantic  "  icy  summits  reared  in  air."  No- 
thing could  have  been  more  peculiar  and  striking  than 
the  contrast  between  the  wild  mountainous  country  be- 
low— visible,  but  darkened  as  in  an  eclipse — and  these 
lofty  domes  and  pinnacles  of  eternal  ice  and  neve.  No 
cloud  or  fleck  of  mist  marred  their  surpassing  radiance. 
Every  glacier, snow-wall,  icy  aiguille,  and  smooth-rounded 
snow-field,  gleamed  with  marvellous  distinctness  in  the 
morning  light,  though  here  and  there  the  sunbeams  drew 
out  a  more  overpowering  brightness.  These  were  the 
Jumnotri  and  Gangotri  peaks,  the  peaks  of  Badrinath  and 
of  the  Hindu  Kailas  ;  the  source  of  mighty  sacred  rivers ; 
the  very  centre  of  the  Himaliya;  the  Himmcl,  or  heaven 
of  the  Teuton  Aryans  as  well  as  of  Hindu  mythology. 
Mount  Meru  itself  may  be  regarded  as  raising  there  its 
golden  front  against  the   sapphire   sky ;  the  Kailas,  or 


32  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

"  Seat  of  Happiness,"  is  the  caelum  of  the  Latins ;  and 
there  is  the  fitting-,  unapproachable  abode  of  Brahma  and 
of  his  attendant  gods,  Gandharvas  and  Rishis. 

But  I  now  felt  determined  to  make  a  closer  acquaint- 
ance with  these  wondrous  peaks — to  move  among  them, 
upon  them,  and  behind  them — so  I  hurried  from  Masuri 
to  Simla  by  the  shortest  route,  that  of  the  carriage-road 
.from  the  foot  of  the  hills  through  the  Sewaliks  to  Saha- 
runpore ;  by  rail  from  thence  to  Ambala,  by  carriage  to 
Kalka,  and  from  Kalka  to  Simla  in  a  jhampan,  by  the 
old  road,  which,  however,  is  not  the  shortest  way  for  that 
last  section,  because  a  mail-cart  now  runs  along  the  new 
road.  Ambala,  and  the  roads  from  thence  to  Simla, 
present  a  very  lively  scene  in  April,  when  the  Governor- 
General,  the  Commander-in-Chief,  the  heads  of  the 
supreme  Government,  their  baggage  and  attendants,  and 
the  clerks  of  the  different  departments,  are  on  their  way 
up  to  the  summer  retreat  of  the  Government  of  India. 
It  is  highly  expedient  for  the  traveller  to  avoid  the  days 
of  the  great  rush,  when  it  is  impossible  for  him  to  find 
conveyance  of  any  kind  at  any  price — and  I  did  so  ;  but 
even  coming  in  among  the  ragtag  and  bobtail, — if  deputy- 
commissioners  and  colonels  commanding  regiments — 
men  so  tremendous  in  their  own  spheres — may  be  thus 
profanely  spoken  of, — there  was  some  difficulty  in  pro- 
curing carriage  and  bungalow  accommodation  ;  and 
there  was  plenty  of  amusing  company, — from  the  ton- 
weight  of  the  post-office  official,  who  required  twenty 
groaning  coolies  to  carry  him,  to  the  dapper  little  lieu- 
tenant or  assistant  deputy-commissioner,  who  cantered 
lightly  along  parapetless  roads  skirting  precipices ;  and 
from  the  heavy-browed  sultana  of  some  Gangetic  station, 
whose  "stern  look  palpably  interrogates  the  amount  of 
your  monthly  paggdr,  to  the  more  lilylike  young  Anglo- 
Indian  dame  or  damsel,  who  darts  at  you  a  Parthian, 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  33 

yet  gentle  glance,  though  shown  "  more  in  the  eyelids 
than  the  eyes,"  as  she  trips  from  her  jhavipan  or  Bareilly 
dandy  into  the  travellers'  bungalow. 

In  the  neighbourhood  of  Simla  there  is  quite  a  collec- 
tion of  sanitariums,  which  are  passed,  or  seen,  by  the 
visitors  to  that  more  famous  place.  The  first  of  these, 
and  usually  the  first  stopping-place  for  the  night  of 
those  who  go  by  the  old  bridle-road  from  Kalka,  is  Kus- 
sowli,  famous  for  its  Himaliyan  beer,  which  is  not  unlike 
the  ordinary  beer  of  Munich.  It  is  more  rainy  than 
Simla,  more  windy,  and  rather  warmer,  though  as  high, 
or  a  little  higher,  and  is  chiefly  occupied  as  a  depot  for 
the  convalescents  of  European  regiments.  Close  to  it 
rises  the  barren  hill  of  Sonawur,  where  there  is  the  (Sir 
Henry)  Lawrence  Asylum,  for  boys  and  girls  of  Euro- 
pean or  mixed  parentage,  between  400  and  500  being 
usually  supported  and  educated  there  at  the  expense  of 
Government.  Two  other  sanitariums,  Dagshai  (Dugshaie) 
and  Subathu  (Subathoo),  are  also  military  depots, — the 
latter  having  large  barracks,  and  houses  with  fine  gar- 
dens and  orchards.  The  British  soldier  improves  greatly 
in  strength  and  appearance  on  these  heights ;  but  it  is 
said  he  does  not  appreciate  the  advantages  of  being 
placed  upon  them.  He  does  not  like  having  to  do  so 
much  for  himself  as  falls  to  his  lot  when  he  is  sent  to  the 
mountains.  He  misses  the  Indian  camp-followers,  who 
treat  him  below  as  a  Chota  Lord  Sahib  ;  and,  above  all, 
he  misses  the  varied  life  of  the  plains,  and  the  amuse- 
ment of  the  bazaar.  I  am  afraid,  too,  mountains  fail 
to  afford  him  much  gratification  after  his  first  burst  of 
pleasure  on  finding  himself  among  and  upon  them. 
"Sure,  and  I've  been  three  times  round  that  big  hill 
to-day,  and  not  another  blessed  thing  is  there  to  do  up 
here!"  I  heard  an  Irish  corporal  indignantly  exclaim. 
To  the  officers  and  their  families  the  hills  are  a  delight- 
ful change;  but  to  the  undeveloped  mind  of  Tommy 

c 


34  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Atkins  they  soon  become  exceedingly  tiresome,  though  1 
believe  the  soldiers  enjoy  much  being  employed  in  the 
working  parties  upon  the  roads,  where  they  have  the 
opportunity  of  laying  by  a  little  money. 

The  mountains  between  Kalka  and  Simla  are  wild  and 
picturesque  enough,  but  they  give  no  idea  of  either  the 
grandeur  or  the  beauty  of  the  Himaliya  ;  and  the  tra- 
veller should  be  warned  against  being  disappointed  with 
them.  No  ranges  of  eternal  snow  are  in  sight  ;  no  forests 
of  lofty  deodar;  no  thick  jungle,  like  that  of  the  Terai  ; 
no  smiling  valleys,  such  as  the  Dehra  Doon.  We  have 
only  the  ascending  of  steep  bare  mountain-sides,  in  order 
to  go  down  them  on  the  other  side,  or  to  wind  along  bare 
mountain-ridges.  The  hills  either  rest  on  each  other,  or 
have  such  narrow  gorges  between  that  there  is  no  room 
for  cultivated  valleys  ;  and  their  faces  are  so  steep,  and 
so  exposed  to  the  action  of  the  Indian  rains,  that  all  the 
soil  is  swept  away  from  them  ;  and  so  we  have  nothing 
to  speak  of  but  red  slopes  of  rock  and  shingle,  with  only 
a  few  terraced  patches  of  cultivation,  and  almost  no  trees 
at  all,  except  in  the  immediate  vicinity  of  the  military 
stations.  The  worst  parts  of  Syria  would  show  to  ad- 
vantage compared  with  the  long  approach  to  Simla.  I 
understand,  however,  that  the  actual  extent  of  cultiva- 
tion is  considerably  greater  than  one  would  readily  sup- 
pose, and  occasionally  the  creeping  vine  and  the  cactus 
do  their  best  to  clothe  the  rocky  surface.  On  ascending 
the  Simla  ridge  itself,  however,  a  change  comes  over  the 
scene.  Himaliyan  cedars  and  oaks  cover  the  heights 
and  crowd  the  glades ;  rhododendrons,  if  it  be  their 
season  of  bloom,  give  quite  a  glory  of  colour  ;  and  both 
white  and  red  roses  appear  among  the  brambles  and 
berberries  of  the  thick  underwood  :  a  healthy  resinous 
odour  meets  one  from  the  forest  of  mighty  pine-trees, 
mingled  with  more  delicate  perfumes  ;  beds  of  fern,  with 
couches  of  moss,  lie  along  the  roadside  ;  masses  of  cloud 


TO  THE  HEIGHTS.  35 

come  rolling  down  the  valleys  from  the  rounded,  thickly- 
wooded  summit  of  Hatto  ;  deep  glens,  also  finely  wooded, 
fall  suddenly  before  our  feet.  On  the  one  side,  over  a 
confusion  of  hills  and  the  edifices  of  Subathu  and  Dag- 
shai,  we  have  glimpses  of  the  yellow  burning  Indian 
plain  ;  on  the  other,  through  the  oak  branches  and  the 
tower-like  stems  of  deodar,  there  shines  the  long  white 
line  of  eternal  snow  upon  the  giant  mountains  of  ChamSa, 
Kulu,  and  Spiti.  It  was  a  matter  of  life  or  death  for  me 
to  reach  those  snowy  solitudes,  and  I  found  the  words  of 
Mignon's  song  in  "  Wilhelm  Meister"  flitting  across  my 
brain,  and  taking  a  new  meaning : — 

Know'st  thou  the  land  where  towering  cedars  rise 
In  graceful  majesty  to  cloudless  skies  ; 
Where  keenest  winds  from  icy  summits  blow 
Across  the  deserts  of  eternal  snow  ? 
Know'st  thou  it  not  ? 

Oh  there  !  oh  there  1 
My  wearied  spirit,  let  us  flee  from  care  ! 

Know'st  thou  the  tent,  its  cone  of  snowy  drill, 
Pitched  on  the  greensward  by  the  snow-fed  rill  ; 
"Where  whiter  peaks  than  marble  rise  around, 
And  icy  ploughshares  pierce  the  flower-clad  ground? 
Know'st  thou  it  well  ? 

Oh  there  !  oh  there  ! 
Where  pipes  the  marmot — fiercely  growls  the  bear  I 

Know'st  thou  the  cliffs  above  the  gorges  dread, 
Where  the  great  yaks  with  trembling  footsteps  tread, 
Beneath  the  Alp,  where  frolic  ibex  play, 
While  snow-fields  sweep  across  the  perilous  way? 
Know'st  thou  it  tints? 

Go  there  !  go  there  ! 
Scale  cliffs,  and  granite  avalanches  dare ! 

Know'st  thou  the  land  where  man  scarce  knows  decay, 
So  nigh  the  realms  of  everlasting  day  ; 
Where  gleam  the  splendours  of  unsullied  truth, 
Where  Durga  smiles,  and  blooms  eternal  youth  ? 
Know'st  thou  it  now? 

Oh  there  !  oh  there  ! 
To  breathe  the  sweetness  of  that  heavenly  air ! 


CHAPTER  II. 

SIMLA    AND   ITS   CELEBRITIES. 

ACCORDING  to  some  people,  and  especially  according  to 
the  house-proprietors  of  Calcutta,  who  view  its  attrac- 
tions with  natural  disfavour,  Simla  is  a  very  sinful  place 
indeed  ;  and  the  residence  there,  during  summer,  of  the 
Viceroy  and  his  members  of  Council  ought  to  be  dis- 
couraged by  a  paternal  Secretary  of  State  for  India. 
The  "Capua  of  India"  is  one  of  the  terms  which  are 
applied  to  it ;  we  hear  sometimes  of  "  the  revels  upon 
Olympus  ;  "  and  one  of  the  papers  seemed  to  imagine 
that  to  describe  any  official  as  "  a  malingerer  at  Simla" 
was  sufficient  to  blast  his  future  life.  Even  the  roses 
and  the  rhododendrons,  the  strawberries  and  che  peaches, 
of  that  "  Circean  retreat,"  come  in  for  their  share  of 
moral  condemnation,  as  contributing  to  the  undeserved 
happiness  of  a  thoughtless  and  voluptuous  community. 
For  this  view  there  is  some  show  of  justification.  Simla 
has  no  open  law  courts  to  speak  of,  or  shipping,  or  mer- 
cantile business,  or  any  of  the  thousand  incidents  which 
furnish  so  much  matter  to  the  newspapers  of  a  great  city. 
The  large  amount  of  important  governmental  business 
which  is  transacted  there  is  seldom  immediately  made 
known,  and  is  usually  first  communicated  to  the  public 
in  other  places.  Hence  there  is  little* for  the  newspaper 
correspondents  to  write  about  except  the  gaieties  of  the 
place  ;  and  so  the  balls  and  picnics,  the  croquet  and 
badminton  parties,  the  flirtations  and  rumoured  engage- 
ments,  are   given    an    importance  which   they  do    not 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  37 

actually  possess,  and  assume  an  appearance  as  if  the 
residents  of  Simla  had  nothing  to  do  but  to  enjoy  them- 
selves and  "  to  chase  the  glowing  hours  with  flying  feet." 
But,  in  reality,  the  dissipation  of  Simla  is  not  to  be 
compared  with  the  dissipation  of  a  London  season  ;  and 
if  the  doings  of  any  English  provincial  town  or  large 
watering-place  in  its  season  were  as  elaborately  chron- 
icled, and  looked  up  to  and  magnified,  maliciously  or 
otherwise,  as  those  of  the  Indian  Capua  are,  the  record 
would  be  of  a  much  more  scandalous  and  more  impos- 
ing kind.  Indeed,  unless  society  is  to  be  put  down  alto- 
gether, or  conducted  on  Quaker  principles,  it  is  difficult 
to  see  how  the  Anglo-Indians,  when  they  go  to  the  hills, 
could  conduct  themselves  much  otherwise  than  as  they 
do:  and  probably  more  in  Simla  than  anywhere  else  there 
exists  the  feeling  that  life  would  be  tolerable  were  it  not 
for  its  amusements.  After  a  hard  day's  office-work,  or 
after  a  picnic  which  involved  a  dozen  miles'  slow  ride, 
and  a  descent  on  foot  for  a  thousand  feet  or  so  into  a 
hot  valley  like  that  of  Mushobra,  it  is  not  by  any  means 
pleasant  to  don  full  dress,  to  put  waterproofs  over  that, 
and  to  go  on  horseback  or  be  carried  in  an  uncomfortable 
jhampan  for  three  or  four  miles,  and  in  a  raging  storm 
of  wind,  thunder,  and  rain,  out  to  a  burra  k/iana,  or  big 
dinner,  which  is  succeeded  in  the  same  or  in  some  other 
house  byalargerevening  party.  Combinations  such  as  this 
turn  social  enjoyment  into  a  stern  duty  ;  and  as  society 
expects  that  every  woman  shall  do  her  duty,  the  ladies 
of  Simla  endure  their  amusements  with  the  courage  and 
spirit  of  Englishwomen,  who,  for  the  sake  of  their  sons 
and  brothers  and  husbands,  even  more  than  their  own 
sakes,  are  not  going  to  be  left  behind  in  sacrificing  aux 
convenances.  But  no  one  who  knows  what  European 
society  is  will  accuse  Simla,  of  the  present  and  preceding 
Viceroyships  at  least,  of  being  an  abode  of  dissipation 


38  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

or  of  light  morality.  Wherever  youth  and  beauty  meet, 
there  will,  no  doubt,  be  a  certain  amount  of  flirtation, 
even  though  the  youth  may  be  rather  shaky  from  long 
years  of  hard  work  in  the  hot  plains  of  India,  or  from 
that  intangible  malady  which  a  friend  styles  as  "  too 
much  East,"  and  though  the  beauty  be  often  pallid  and 
passe ;  but  anything  beyond  that  hardly  exists  at  Simla 
at  all,  and  has  the  scantiest  opportunity  for  developing 
itself.  Over-worked  secretaries  to  Government,  and 
elderly  members  of  Council,  are  not  given  either  to  in- 
dulge in  levity  of  conduct,  or  to  wink  at  it  in  others  ;  the 
same  may  be  said  of  their  ladies  ;  and  the  young  officers 
and  civilians  who  go  up  to  Simla  for  their  leave  are 
usually  far-seeing  young  men  who  have  an  eye  to  good 
appointments,  and,  whatever  their  real  character  may  be, 
are  not  likely  to  spoil  their  chances  of  success  by  attract- 
ing attention  to  themselves  as  very  gay  Lotharios. 
Moreover,  at  Simla,  as  almost  everywhere  in  India,  people 
live  under  glass  cases  ;  everything  they  do  is  known 
to  their  native  servants  and  to  the  native  community, 
who  readily  communicate  their  knowledge  of  such  matters 
to  Europeans.  Before  the  Mutiny,  and  perhaps  for  some 
time  after  it,  matters  were  somewhat  different.  From 
whatever  cause,  the  natives,  though  they  saw  the  doings 
of  the  English  in  India,  were  as  if  they  saw  not,  and,  as 
a  rule,  communicated  their  knowledge  on  the  subject 
only  to  each  other.  Now  they  not  only  see,  but  speak  freely 
enough  ;  and  no  immorality  can  be  carried  on  in  an 
Indian  station  without  its  being  known  all  over  the 
station,  except,  perhaps,  in  cases  where  the  offenders 
are  exceedingly  popular  with  the  natives,  or  are  in  very 
high  powerful  positions,  or  the  party  sinned  against  is 
very  much  disliked. 

Some  sneers  have  been  indulged  in  of  late,  even  in 
Parliament,  at  the  alleged  industry  of  members  of  the 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  39 

Supreme  Council  and  other  officials  to  be  found  at 
Simla,  as  if  a  certain  amount  of  hospitality  and  of  min- 
gling in  society  were  incompatible  with  leading  a  labo- 
rious life.  But  if  we  except  the  soldiers  and  regi- 
mental officers,  it  will  be  found  that  most  of  the  English 
in  India,  be  they  civilians,  staff  officers,  educationalists, 
surgeons,  merchants,  missionaries,  or  editors,  are  com- 
pelled  to  live  very  laborious  days,  whether  they  may 
scorn  delights  or  not.  A  late  Indian  Governor,  accus- 
tomed to  Parliamentary  and  Ministerial  life  in  England, 
used  to  declare  that  he  had  never  been  required  to  work 
so  hard  in  London  as  he  was  in  his  comparatively 
unimportant  Presidency  town.  "  Every  one  is  over- 
worked in  India,"  was  remarked  to  me  by  an  Oudh 
Director  of  Public  Instruction,  who  was  himself  a  not- 
able instance  of  the  assertion  :  and  I  have  often  had 
occasion  to  notice  how  much  overtasked  Indian  officials 
of  the  higher  grades  are,  and  that  in  a  country  where 
the  mind  works  a  good  deal  more  reluctantly  and  slowly 
than  in  Europe,  and  where  there  is  very  little  pleasure 
in  activity  of  any  kind  for  its  own  sake.  It  is  absurd  to 
suppose  that  the  immense  task  of  Indian  government 
can  be  accomplished  by  the  handful  of  Englishmen 
there,  without  the  greatest  strain  upon  their  individual 
energies.  Not  only  have  they  to  do  all  the  ordinary 
work  of  a  European  Government — they  have  also  them- 
selves to  fill  the  greater  number  of  judicial,  revenue, 
and  educational  appointments,  to  construct  public  works, 
to  direct  the  police,  to  accomplish  great  part  of  the 
work  of  governing  which,  in  England,  is  performed 
by  hundreds  of  thousands  of  county  gentlemen  and 
city  magnates  ;  and  over  and  above  all  that,  it  is  expected 
that  they  shall  save  the  Indian  people  from  the  conse- 
quences of  famine,  and  be  able  to  show  every  year  that 
they  have  elevated  that  people  in  the  scale  of  humanity. 


4o  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

The  supervision  of  all  this  arduous  labour — the  per- 
formance of  a  certain  share  of  its  details — the  sitting  in 
judgment  on  numerous  appeal  cases  of  the  most  various 
and  complicated  kind — the  management  of  our  relation- 
ships with  great  native  States  both  within  and  without 
the  Indian  peninsula — the  settlement  of  important  ques- 
tions of  the  most  difficult  kind — and  by  far  the  greater 
share  of  the  immense  responsibility  of  governing  an  alien 
empire  of  nearly  two  hundred  millions  of  people — all 
this,  and  much  more,  falls  upon  the  Supreme  Govern- 
ment, whether  it  be  located  at  Calcutta  or  at  Simla; 
and  to  compel  it  to  remain  nearly  all  the  year  in  the 
unhealthy  delta  of  the  Ganges  would  be  to  burden  it 
with  a  good  deal  more  than  the  straw  which  breaks  the 
camel's  back. 

It  is  obvious  at  Simla  that  the  Supreme  Government 
has  selected  for  its  summer  residence  about  the  best 
place  to  be  found  among  the  outer  Himaliya.  The 
duties  of  the  Government  of  India  will  not  allow  that 
Government  to  bury  itself  in  the  interior  of  the  great 
mountains,  where  much  more  healthy  spots  are  to  be 
found,  or  to  select  any  place  of  residence  far  distant 
from  railway  communication.  As  it  is,  the  Viceroy, 
with  his  staff,  and  all  the  members  of  Council,  and  the 
secretaries  to  Government,  could  be  at  Ambala,  on  the 
great  railway-line,  in  about  twelve  hours  after  leaving 
Simla,  or  even  less  on  a  push  ;  and  fifty  hours  by  rail 
would  take  them  to  Calcutta,  or  sixty  hours  to  Bombay. 
They  are  in  close  proximity  to  the  Panjab,  and  have  the 
railway  from  Ambala  to  Lahore  and  Multan,  with 
steamers  from  the  latter  place  down  the  Indus  to  its 
mouth  or  to  Kotri,  from  whence  there  is  a  short  line  of 
railway  to  the  port  of  Karachi.  Delhi,  Agra,  and  all 
the  great  cities  of  the  north-west  are  within  easy  reach. 
They  are  in  much  closer  proximity  to  any  cities   and 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  41 

districts  likely  to  be  dangerous  than  they  would  be  at 
Calcutta,  and  are.  also  much  nearer  to  the  places  which 
give  rise  to  difficult  questions  of  policy.  In  old  times  it 
was  different ;  but  now,  with  the  rail  and  telegraph  going 
over  the  land,  it  is  of  little  importance  in  which  of  a 
hundred  places  the  Indian  Government  may  be  situated; 
but  it  is  of  great  importance  that  its  members  should 
not  be  unnecessarily  exposed  to  the  depressing  and 
destroying  influence  of  the  Indian  hot  season  and  rains. 
It  only  remains  to  remove  the  headquarters  of  Govern- 
ment from  Calcutta  to  some  more  central  position,  such 
as  Agra  or  Allahabad  ;  and  I  fancy  only  financial  con- 
siderations stand  in  the  way  of  that  being  done,  for  it 
would  involve  the  erection  of  a  number  of  new  Govern- 
ment buildings. 

Society  everywhere  in  India  labours  under  very  great 
disadvantages,  and  varies  very  much  according  to  the 
character  of  its  ever-changing  leaders.  Sir  Emerson 
Tennent  has  observed  that  it  is  "  unhappily  the  ten- 
dency of  small  sections  of  society  to  decompose  when 
separated  from  the  great  vital  mass,  as  pools  stagnate 
and  putrefy  when  cut  off  from  the  invigorating  flow  of 
the  sea  ;"  and  he  adds  that  the  process  is  variable,  so 
that  a  colonial  society  which  is  repulsive  to-day  may 
be  attractive  to-morrow,  or  a  contrary  change  may  take 
place  with  one  or  two  departures  or  new  arrivals.  The 
same  holds  good  in  India  ;  and  though  Indian  society 
can  boast  of  some  superiority  to  colonial  (a  superiority 
which  is  amusingly  asserted  on  board  mail-steamers), 
it  has  very  great  defects  of  its  own,  and  in  certain 
circumstances  degenerates  into  the  intolerable.  One 
tendency  of  life  in  India  is  to  create  an  immense 
amount  of  conceit,  and  to  make  men  assume  airs  of 
superiority,  not  because  of  any  superiority  of  mind  or 
character,   or  on  account  of  great  services  rendered  to 


42  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

the  State,  but  simply  because  long  residence  in  the 
country,  or  in  some  particular  district  of  it,  has  given 
them  high  appointments,  or  the  advantage  as  regards 
local  knowledge.  Then,  though  military  society  has 
many  good  points,  "  discipline  must  be  observed ;" 
and  it  was  in  perfect  good  faith,  and  expressing  his 
own  opinion,  as  well  as  that  which  he  believed  to  be 
generally  entertained,  that  an  old  Indian  remarked  to 
me,  "  We  don't  think  much  of  any  one's  opinions 
here  until  he  is  a  lieutenant-colonel  at  least."  Of 
course  in  all  countries  opinions  are  often  measured  by 
the  position  of  the  spokesman  ;  but  in  Europe  that  is 
not  so  much  the  case  as  in  India,  and  in  our  happier 
climes  it  is  easy  to  shun  the  society  of  snobs,  whether 
social  or  intellectual,  without  becoming  a  social  pariah. 
This  social  tendency  is  not  corrected,  but  developed 
rather  than  otherwise,  by  a  close  bureaucracy  such  as 
the  Indian  Civil  Service — and  there  is  no  other  element 
in  the  community  sufficiently  strong  to  correct  it; 
while  it  is  almost  justified  by  the  extraordinary  effect 
India  has  in  rapidly  producing  intense  conceit  and  in- 
sufferable presumption  among  Europeans  of  a  low 
order  of  mind  and  character,  whatever  classes  of  the 
community  they  may  belong  to.  Nothing  struck  me 
more  in  that  country  than  the  contrast  between  its 
elevating  and  even  ennobling  effects  on  those  Euro- 
peans whose  minds  were  above  a  certain  level,  and  its 
exactly  contrary  effects  on  almost  all  those  who  were 
below  that  level.  What,  then,  Indian  society  has 
specially  to  struggle  against  are  two  apparently  oppo- 
site tendencies, — a  slavish  respect  for  mere  position, 
and  for  exceptional  power  and  knowledge  in  parti- 
cular directions  ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  excessive 
individual  conceit  and  presumption.  But  these  evil 
tendencies    (which,   curiously    enough,    belong    also    to 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  43 

the  Indian  native  character)  are  not  opposed  in  any 
such  way  as  to  counteract  each  other.  On  the  con- 
trary, they  are  apt  to  foster  and  inflame  each  other ; 
because  the  old  Indian  justly  sees  that  he  has  op- 
posed to  him  an  immense  deal  of  ignorant  presump- 
tion which  ought  to  be  severely  repressed,  while  the 
democrat  and  the  griffin  instinctively  feel  that  they 
are  oppressed  by  an  amount  of  tyrannical  old  fogyism 
which  would  not  be  allowed  to  exist  in  any  other 
country.  The  more  acute  English  travellers  see  a 
little  of  this  state  of  matters  ;  but  everything  is  made 
as  pleasant  as  possible  to  travellers  in  India  with 
good  introductions;  and  it  is  necessary  to  reside  for 
some  time  in  the  country  in  order  to  understand  what 
an  absolute  nonentity  a  man  is  in  himself,  and  how 
entirely  his  importance,  his  accomplishments,  his  char- 
acter, his  value,  and  his  very  raisoti  d'etre,  depend  on 
the  appointment  which  he  holds.  I  do  not  at  all 
wonder  at  that  old  sergeant  in  a  very  out-of-the-way 
place  in  the  jungle,  who,  on  being  asked  what  he  did 
there,  answered  with  some  surprise,  "Why,  sir,  I  fills 
the  sitivation."  In  Anglo-India  you  not  only  fill  the 
situation  ;  it  is  the  situation  that  fills  you,  and  makes 
you  what  you  are,  and  without  which  you  would  im- 
mediately collapse. 

These  observations  are  necessary  to  explain  the  great 
superiority  of  Simla  society,  when  I  knew  it,  over  the 
society  to  be  found  in  nearly  all  other  places  in  India. 
That  superiority  would  not  be  accounted  for  merely  by 
the  number  of  high  officers  collected  there,  whom  a 
process  of  selection  had  brought  to  the  front.  In  a 
community  such  as  that  of  India,  the  two  strong  evil 
tendencies  which  I  have  just  noticed  as  specially  exist- 
ing there,  are  most  effectually  held  in  check  when  the 
highest  appointments  are  held  by  men  of  high  intellect 


44  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

and  good  disposition,  using  the  latter  phrase  so  as  to 
exclude  alike  the  pharisee  and  the  prodigal.  Whenever 
the  leaders  of  society  are  essentially  commonplace  men, 
whose  only  claim  to  distinction  is  that  they  fill  the 
situation,  society  degrades  to  a  state  which  is  almost 
inconceivable  in  Europe.  Everything  is  lost  sight  of 
except  the  cunning  faculty  of  serving  the  incompetent 
ruling  powers,  so  as  to  secure  good  appointments  from 
their  hands.  Then  rises  supreme  an  incompetent,  unin- 
tellectual,  yet  unscrupulous  and  overbearing  element, 
which  has  no  sympathetic  relationship  to  the  great 
sacrifices,  the  difficulties,  and  the  future  of  our  position 
in  India  :  where  true  gentlemanliness  disappears,  in- 
tellect is  undervalued,  and  genius  is  regarded  as  some- 
thing like  a  stray  panther  or  tiger.  It  is  then  that, 
while  the  people  of  India  are  treated  with  excessive  and 
inexcusable  arrogance,  at  the  same  time  the  most 
necessary  safeguards  against  mutiny  and  rebellion  are 
carelessly  neglected  ;  and  when  popular  commotions  do 
appear,  they  are  allowed  to  gather  head,  and  to  reach  a 
dangerous  height  before  anything  like  effective  attempts 
are  made  to  deal  with  them. 

In  Simla,  last  year,  the  state  of  matters  was  very 
different  from  that  which  I  have  just  described.  In 
both  the  Viceroy  and  the  Commander-in-Chief,  India 
had  the  good  fortune  to  possess  able  and  experienced 
noblemen,  who  thoroughly  understood,  and  rose  to  the 
level  of,  the  higher  responsibilities  of  their  position. 
This  alone  was  sufficient  to  elevate  the  whole  tone  of 
the  society  about  them,  in  a  community  which  so 
readily  answers  to  the  guidance  of  its  official  leaders; 
and  they  had  around  them  a  considerable  number  of 
able,  conscientious,  and  high-minded  Englishmen.  I 
was  only  at  Simla  during  the  month  of  May,  but  had 
sufficient  opportunity  of  observing  that   Lord   North- 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  45 


brook  might  be  compared  not  unfavourably  with  many 
of  the  greater  Governor-Generals  of  India  ;  and  that 
the  instinct  of  the  people  of  the  country,  which  had  led 
them  to  esteem  and  trust  him  almost  from  the  com- 
mencement of  his  Viceroyship,  was  by  no  means  an 
erroneous  one.  They  are  extremely  acute,  and  won- 
derfully just  judges  of  character ;  and  I  knew  that  ■ 
their  opinion  on  this  subject  was  shared  by  many  of 
the  Englishmen  who  were  best  acquainted  with  India, 
and  most  devoted  to  its  interests.  If  the  new  Viceroy 
did  not  equal  Lord  Mayo  in  charm  of  personal  manner, 
and  in  power  of  setting  every  one  around  him  to  work 
energetically  on  their  own  lines,  he  possessed  what  is 
more  specially  needed  at  present,  more  than  Lord 
Mayo's  power  of  holding  his  great  officers  in  hand, 
and  of  refusing  to  allow  their  specialties  and  crotchets 
being  run  to  excess,  and  developed  to  the  detriment 
of  India  and  of  the  imperial  interests  of  Great  Britain. 
If  he  had  not  all  Lord  Elgin's  experience  and 
large-minded  dealing  with  the  outlying  questions 
of  English  policy,  he  brought  to  bear  upon  them  the 
caution,  the  trained  habits,  the  ceaseless,  thoughtful 
energy  of  an  English  statesman,  in  a  manner  which 
colonial  and  Indian  officials  have  little  opportunity  of 
practising  themselves  in.  If  the  insinuations  of  some 
of  the  newspaper  correspondents  are  true,  he  may  be 
deficient  in  Lord  William  Bentinck's  aristocratic  calm- 
ness under  criticism  and  judicial  appreciation  of  the 
value  of  the  Indian  press.  But  it  is  certain  that  India 
has  in  him  a  Governor-General  of  high  character  and  of 
pure-minded  unselfish  disposition,  which  it  can  greatly 
trust.  I  could  not  but  be  struck  during  my  stay  at 
Simla  with  his  genuineness  of  character,  his  clearness  of 
vision,  and  his  unaffected  kindness  and  consideration. 
Even  in  two   mistakes  which,  as  it  seemed  to  me,  he 


46  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

has  made,  his  errors  were  almost  redeemed  by  his 
manner  of  committing  them.  I  allude  to  his  approval 
of  the  conduct  of  the  Panjab  officials  towards  Mr 
Downes  of  the  Church  Mission,  who  made  an  attempt 
to  reach  Kafiristan  through  the  Kaubul  territory  ;  and 
to  a  social  question  which  arose  between  Government 
House  and  Major  Fenwick  of  the  Civil  and  Military 
Gazette;  but  in  both  these  cases  Lord  Northbrook 
acted  in  an  open  manner,  which  excited  the  respect 
even  of  some  who  most  differed  from  his  conclusions. 
And  though,  of  course,  he  is  not  infallible,  many  errors 
of  judgment  are  not  to  be  expected  from  him,  and  are 
more  likely  to  arise  from  a  supposed  necessity  of 
backing  up  the  action  of  his  subordinates,  than  where 
he  himself  originates  the  action.  For  there  is  a  white 
light  in  his  mind  which  illuminates  every  object  on 
which  it  shines — a  searching  piercing  light,  proceeding 
from  the  Viceroy's  own  mind,  and  not  from  the  mere 
focussing  of  other  rays.  There  is  something  of  genius 
in  this  power  which  he  possesses  of  lighting  up  a  sub- 
ject, and  it  is  the  more  remarkable  as  existing  in  con- 
junction with  his  precise  business  habits.  It  struck  me 
there  was  a  tendency  in  his  Excellency's  mind  to  draw 
rather  too  decided  straight  lines,  even  where  conflicting 
interests  interlap ;  but,  truly,  if  he  were  to  begin  pon- 
dering over  matters  as  a  many-sided  Coleridge  might 
do,  the  public  business  of  India  would  come  to  a  dead 
lock  within  twenty-four  hours.  If  he  had  once  formed 
an  opinion  on  any  subject,  I  doubt  if  it  would  be  easy 
for  him  to  renounce  or  modify  it — though  those  who 
know  his  Excellency  well  say  that  he  is  always  ready 
to  do  so  whenever  new  facts  relating  to  the  matter  come 
before  him  :  but  this  rather  supports  my  view  ;  because 
in  most  great  questions  the  difficulty  is  not  so  much  to 
get  at  the  facts,  as  to  perceive  their  relationships,  and 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  47 

to  take  these  latter  into  one  comprehensive  judicial 
view.  The  amount  of  business  which  he  goes  through 
is  remarkable  ;  and  more  than  Lord  Amherst  was,  he  is 
entitled  to  say  with  some  surprise,  "  The  Emperor  of 
China  and  I  govern  half  the  human  race,  and  yet  we 
find  time  to  breakfast ;"  for  he  is  exceedingly  regardful 
of  the  courtesies,  and  of  even  something  more  than  the 
courtesies,  of  his  trying  and  responsible  position.  We 
do  not  hear  so  much  of  Lord  Northbrook's  feats  on 
horseback  as  we  did  of  those  of  his  predecessor ;  but 
they  are  not  less  remarkable.  It  is  only  about  fifty-two 
miles  from  Simla  to  Kotgarh ;  but  the  nature  of  the 
bridle-road  is  such,  and  it  runs  along  the  top  of  so 
many  precipices,  that  it  is  rather  a  feat  to  ride  over  it  in 
less  than  a  day  ;  and  I  have  also  heard  of  his  Lordship 
riding  from  Chini  to  Narkunda  in  a  dangerously  short 
period.  I  may  also  note  the  Viceroy's  habit  of  walk- 
ing .about  unguarded,  accompanied  by  a  single  friend; 
and  have  heard  of  his  being  seen  alone  with  his  son,  or 
some  other  youth,  after  dark,  close  to  the  Ganges,  near 
Barrackpore.  This  may  be  thought  unwise  courage  ; 
but  though  undoubtedly  courage,  I  am  not  sure  that 
it  is  unwise;  for  really  life  is  not  worth  having  on  the 
condition  of  its  being  constantly  guarded.  The  class 
of  men  who  violently  assassinate  in  India  admire  this 
kind  of  courage  so  much  that  they  will  not  readily 
strike  at  it ;  and  most  cases  of  assassination  which 
occur  in  that  country  have  been  committed  in  spite  of 
the  close  protection  of  guards.  It  is  doubtful,  however, 
if  it  be  wise  to  have  Simla  so  unprotected  as  it  appears 
to  be.  I  do  not  remember  seeing  a  single  European 
soldier  there,  unless  the  Governor-General's  band  be 
accounted  as  such.  The  only  representatives  of  law 
and  order  visible  were  two  European  police-officers,  a 
few    native     policemen,    and    the    Governor-General's 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


native  body-guard.  It  would  not  have  been  difficult  to 
have  extinguished  the  whole  Government  of  India  in 
one  night;  and  a  danger  of  that  sort,  however  remote 
and  unlikely,  ought  to  be  guarded  against.  Nothing  in 
India  was  held  to  be  more  unlikely  than  the  Mutiny, 
until  it  occurred,  and  even  after  it  had  commenced. 

At  the  close  of  this  Parliament,  Her  Majesty  has  ac- 
knowledged the  great  services  of  Lord  Northbrook,  in 
connection  with  the  Bengal  famine,  in  a  manner  which 
could  scarcely  have  come  from  a  Ministry  opposed  to 
that  which  appointed  him,  unless  his  "  strenuous  exer- 
tions "  had  really  merited  very  "  high  approbation."  It 
is  now  seen  by  the  public  generally  that  he  has  met  the 
great  and  disturbing  disaster  of  the  famine  in  a  masterly 
manner.  When  he  was  exerting  himself  to  the  utmost, 
it  was  inexpedient  for  the  Viceroy  to  speak  of  the 
measures  he  was  taking  to  meet  the  coming  calamity, 
and  advantage  was  taken  of  his  mouth  being  sealed,  and 
of  his  having  wisely  refused  to  prohibit  the  export  of 
rice,  to  criticise  and  assail  him.  Whether  intentionally 
or  not,  an  impression  was  created  that  the  Viceroy  did 
not  see  the  magnitude  of  the  danger,  and  would  not  of 
himself  take  energetic  and  sufficient  steps  to  meet  it. 
Highly  sensational  telegrams  and  articles  to  this  effect 
appeared  in  rapid  succession  ;  and  it  was  left  out  of 
mind  that,  on  the  very  first  report  of  danger,  Lord 
Northbrook  hurried  down  from  Simla  to  Calcutta  before 
the  conclusion  of  the  unhealthiest  month  of  the  year, 
and  at  once  brought  all  his  great  energy  to  bear  on  the 
subject  of  the  famine.  He  could  not  proclaim  from  the 
housetops  any  intention  of  buying  up  millions  on  mil- 
lions of  tons  of  rice,  and,  if  necessary,  of  feeding  two  and 
a  half  millions  of  people  for  an  indefinite  period  ;  because, 
to  have  done  so,  would  have  vastly  increased  the  diffi- 
culty, by  making  the  bunnias  throughout  India  buy  and 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  49 

store  up  rice  right  and  left,  and  by  creating  a  great 
movement  into  the  famine  districts  of  people  desirous  of 
participating  in  the  bounty  of  Government.  Also,  as 
the  event  has  shown,  while  making  perfectly  sufficient 
arrangements  to  meet  the  coming  famine,  the  Viceroy 
refused,  on  sound  economic  grounds,  to  interfere  with 
and  chock  private  trade,  by  prohibiting  the  export  of 
rice  from  Bengal  ;  and  this  was  immediately  seized  upon 
as  a  proof  that  he  did  not  understand  the  magnitude  of 
the  coming  crisis,  and  that  he  required  to  be  instructed, 
warned,  and  brought  up  to  a  sense  of  duty  by  his  bene- 
volent and  omniscient  critics.  It  was  most  fortunate  for 
India  that  at  this  crisis  a  thoughtful  statesman  was  at 
the  head  of  affairs,  and  one  of  sufficient  force  of  charac- 
ter to  disregard  the  outcry  which  was  raised  against  him. 
An  excellent  authority  on  the  spot,  as  quoted  by  the 
Calcutta  correspondent  of  the  Times,  has  well  said  :  "  It 
will  not  be  denied,  that  had  it  not  been  for  the  action 
taken  by  Government,  the  mortality  would  have  been 
very  great.  But  I  am  convinced  that  it  is  equally  true, 
that  had  Government  action  been  of  a  nature  to  check 
private  trade  to  any  extent,  the  result  would  also  have 
been  calamitous.  ...  I  firmly  believe,  that  had  Govern- 
ment, last  November,  proclaimed  to  the  world  that  they 
intended  to  rely  solely  on  their  own  unaided  efforts  to 
save  the  people  from  starvation,  the  result  would  have 
been  deplorable,  both  financially  and  in  respect  to  the 
loss  of  life  which  would  have  ensued."  This  is  another 
very  important  view  of  the  matter,  and  is  by  no  means 
opposed  to  what  I  have  said  about  the  bunnias  ;  because 
they  would  have  bought  and  stored  grain,  in  order  to 
sell  it  to  the  Government,  rather  than  with  a  view  to  the 
difficult  and  risky  operation  of  conveying  it  into  the 
famine  districts.  The  Viceroy  had  also  to  guard  against 
the  danger  of  inviting  or  allowing  the  people  within  the 

D 


50  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

famine  circle  to  rely  too  much  on  Government  aid,  which 
the  natives  of  India  are  always  most  ready  to  do. 

The  crisis  of  the  Bengal  famine  of  1 874  has  now 
passed,  and  it  is  difficult  to  know  whether  to  admire 
most  the  manner  in  which  Lord  Northbrook  and  Sir 
Richard  Temple  have  dealt  with  it  so  as  to  prevent 
almost  any  loss  of  life,  or  their  success  in  managing  the 
relief  operations,  so  as  to  avoid  pauperising,  or  otherwise 
demoralising  the  people,  and  so  as  to  bring  them  readily 
back  to  their  ordinary  industrial  operations.  The  first 
of  these  feats  was  entirely  new  in  the  history  of  India  ; 
the  second  was  still  more  difficult  of  accomplishment  ; 
its  success  presents  both  rulers  and  ruled  in  the  most 
pleasing  light,  and  is  a  new  illustration  of  the  readiness 
of  the  people  of  India  to  appreciate  and  conjoin  with 
action  on  the  part  of  Englishmen,  which  is  at  once  sym- 
pathetic and  decided.  Large  powers  are  necessary  to 
deal  with  them  in  a  satisfactory  manner,  and,  to  that 
end,  these  powers  must  be  exercised  with  knowledge  of 
the  necessities  and  wishes  of  the  people,  and  yet  with  a 
confidence  and  decision  which  are  only  accepted  and 
only  tolerable  when  springing  from  a  just  conviction  that 
the  action  undertaken  and  insisted  upon  is  in  accordance 
with  the  highest  intelligence  and  morality. 

But,  though  unwilling  to  enter  here  on  the  general 
subject  of  Indian  policy,  I  must  guard  against  appear- 
ing, even  for  a  moment,  to  support  the  limited  view 
which  some  of  Lord  Northbrook's  admirers  and  critics 
take  of  the  course  which  is  marked  out  for  him  as 
Governor-General  of  our  great  Eastern  Empire,  and 
must  make  a  few  general  remarks,  which,  though  brief, 
are  of  cardinal  moment.  According  to  that  view,  the 
only  matter  of  essential  importance  for  India  is  to  reduce 
its  expenditure,  and  to  keep  that  steadily  within  the 
limits  of  the  revenue  which  may  be  afforded  by  the  pre- 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  51 

sent  recognised  and  understood  taxation.  It  is  assumed, 
that  if  that  only  be  done,  everything  will  go  well — there 
will  be  no  disaffection  in  India  ;  and  a  grateful  populace 
will  ornament  us  with  garlands  of  yellow  flowers,  feast 
us  upon  pan  siipdri,  and  shower  blessings  upon  our 
honoured  heads.  I  believe  that  a  greater  mistake  could 
not  be  made,  and  that  this  would  be  only  another  side  of 
Lord  Lawrence's  policy  of  "masterly  imbecility,"  which 
has  thrown  Central  Asia  into  the  hands  of  Russia. 
Economy  and  strict  financial  management  are  very 
necessary  in  India,  and  the  Viceroy  has  clearly  seen 
that,  and  has  addressed  himself  to  the  task  with  extra- 
ordinary skill,  energy,  self-abnegation,  and  success.  But 
if. there  is  a  matter  on  which  the  people  of  India  are 
likely  to  overvalue  his  services  and  urge  him  to  excess, 
it  is  on  that  of  financial  economy.  No  one  admires 
more  than  I  do  their  many  admirable  qualities,  but 
among  these  financial  wisdom  cannot  be  reckoned. 
They  have  no  objections  to  a  native  prince  levying  the 
most  enormous  and  oppressive  taxation  in  very  hurtful 
time-honoured  ways,  and  spending  it  in  the  most  reck- 
less, useless,  and  debauching  manner.  He  may  take 
half  the  produce  of  their  fields,  and  lavish  it  on  dancing- 
girls,  devotees,  beggars,  and  in  support  of  degrading 
superstitions,  and  they  are  perfectly  satisfied  ;  but  let 
the  English  Government  incur  a  productive  new  ex- 
penditure, or  impose  a  new  tax  of  the  least  hurtful  kind, 
and  they  are  the  most  oppressed  and  afflicted  beings  in 
the  world.  We  hear  a  great  deal  about  India  being  a 
poor  country — and  that  is  a  statement  which  should  be 
taken  with  much  qualification,  for  the  concealed  or 
hoarded  treasure  of  India  must  be  something  enor- 
mous ;  but  in  so  far  as  India  is  a  poor  country,  how  and 
why  is  it  poor?  It  is  poor,  not  from  any  sterility  of  its 
Boil  or  scantiness  of  its  products,  or  from  any  incapacity 


52  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


of  labouring  or  acquiring  knowledge  among  its  people: 
in  these  respects  it  is  one  of  the  most  favoured  lands  on 
earth.  It  is  poor  because  it  loves  to  lie  down  and 
dream,  rather  than  to  rise  up  and  work  ;  because  it 
hoards  its  wealth — buries  it  in  the  ground,  or  sits  upon 
it — in  preference  to  turning  it  to  profitable  use;  be- 
cause, except  where  the  pride  of  noble  families  produces 
female  infanticide,  it  not  only  exercises  no  restraint 
upon  the  increase  of  population,  but  even,  in  accord- 
ance with  its  religious  ideas,  regards  any  increase,  how- 
ever reckless,  as  partaking  of  the  merit  of  a  religious 
act ;  and  because  it  is  absolutely  eaten  up  by  non-pro- 
ductive classes  of  people — priests,  devotees,  beggars, 
retainers,  family  dependants,  and  princes  and  nobles  of 
many  fallen  dynasties.  The  most  energetic  and  the 
richest  country  in  the  world  could  not  stand  what  India 
not  only  bears  but  welcomes,  without  bringing  itself  to 
poverty  ;  and  if  all  the  English  Raj  is  to  do  for  India  is 
to  add  another  class  of  unfortunates  to  it,  in  the  shape 
of  overworked  and  underpaid  European  officials,  with 
their  descendants,  then  I  can  only  say  that  the  English 
Raj  is  extremely  likely  to  have  soon  to  make  way  for 
that  of  Russia  or  Germany.  The  essential  considera- 
tion has  been  lost  sight  of,  that  either  we  ought  to  be  in 
India  as  a  nation,  in  our  imperial  capacity,  or  ought  not 
to  be  there  at  all.  A  spurious  philanthropy  (the  real 
motive  of  which  has  too  often  been  the  difficulty  the 
civilians  have  had  in  dealing  with  the  independency  of 
character  of  outside  Englishmen,  and  with  their  some- 
times irrational  and  brutal  humours)  has  only  resulted 
in  pushing  forward  a  class  of  natives  who  exercise  no 
influence  over  the  people,  are  entirely  mistrusted  by 
them,  and  who  cannot  but  regard  us  with  hatred.  At 
the  same  time,  we  have  ignored  the  primary  duty  of 
providing  that  the  work    of  governing   and   elevating 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  53 

India  shall  not  be  ruinous  to  those  who  are  engaged  in 
it,  or  to  their  descendants.  Hence  the  creation  of  a 
large  and  ever-increasing  class  of  poor  whites  and  half- 
castes,  who  are  a  scandal  to  the  Christian  name  and  the 
white  race,  having  been  forced  by  circumstances  to 
depths  of  misery  and  depravity  unknown  among  the 
jungle  tribes,  and  hence  the  painful  fact  that  the  large 
towns  of  India  contain  a  number  of  respectable,  fairly 
educated  English  and  Eurasian  people  who  are  at  their 
wits'  end  how  to  live.  The  financial  question  is  chiefly 
a  negative  one,  meaning  the  suppression  of  jobbery  and 
folly.  The  lasting  reputation  of  a  Governor-General 
will  depend  on  the  services  he  has  rendered  in  saving 
India  from  itself,  in  developing  its  grand  capacities, 
and  in  making  it  an  integral  and  valuable  constituent 
of  the  British  Empire. 

The  famine  has  also  vindicated  the  character  of  a 
high  officer  who  last  year  was  looked  upon  with  not  a 
little  disfavour.  Chiefly  owing  to  his  connection  with 
the  income-tax,  no  one  was  more  unpopular  in  India 
than  Sir  Richard  Temple,  then  the  financial  member  of 
Council,  but  now  the  Lieutenant-Governor  of  Bengal ; 
and  if  he  were  the  popularity-hunter  which  some  people 
fancy  him  to  be,  he  would  have  taken  care  not  to  asso- 
ciate himself  with  so  obnoxious  a  tax.  In  various 
appointments,  but  especially  as  secretary  to  the  Panjab 
Government  and  as  Commissioner  of  the  Central  Pro- 
vinces, Sir  Richard  had  proved  himself  to  be  an  officer 
of  very  great  ability  and  of  the  rarest  energy.  In  the 
Central  Provinces,  development,  which  was  forced  on  by 
circumstances,  and  which  might  well  have  occupied  a 
century,  had  to  be  provided  for  and  regulated  within  a 
few  years  ;  and  this  was  admirably  effected  by  the 
Commissioner,  so  as  to  gain  for  him  the  very  highest 
repute  as  an  organiser  and  administrator.     It  is  some- 


54  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

times  said  that  he  has  great  powers  of  using  other  men's 
brains ;  but  that  is  really  one  of  the  most  important 
qualities  for  a  high  Indian  official,  as  for  all  leaders  of 
mankind,  and  I  never  heard  the  slightest  complaint 
made  on  that  score  by  the  men  whose  brains  he  had 
used.  On  the  contrary,  they  said  he  had  made  a  legiti- 
mate and  the  best  use  of  their  work,  and  was  always 
ready  to  advance  the  fortunes  of  those  who  served  under 
him — a  generosity  which  is  seldom,  if  ever,  displayed  by 
humbugs  and  men  of  small  calibre.  I  thoroughly  be- 
lieve that  the  income-tax  was  a  most  unsuitable  tax  for 
India,  and  that  Lord  Northbrook  rendered  a  great 
service  by  putting  an  end  to  it,  let  me  hope,  for  all  time; 
because  it  brought  in  an  insignificant  sum  (to  the  Gov- 
ernment), did  not  touch  the  really  wealthy  classes,  and 
caused  an  immense  deal  of  oppression  and  irritation:  and 
I  should  doubt  the  legislative  capacity  and  higher  states- 
manship of  any  one  who  upheld  the  income-tax  in  India, 
and  do  not  think  Sir  Richard  Temple  showed  to  advan- 
tage as  a  financier  and  member  of  Council ;  but  the 
Bengal  famine  has  happily  served  to  display  his  great 
powers.  One  of  his  invaluable  qualities  as  an  adminis- 
trator is  his  extraordinary  and  almost  instinctive  know- 
ledge of  character.  He  is  said — and  I  can  well  believe 
it — never  to  make  a  mistake  in  choosing  his  agents, 
almost  never  to  overlook  a  man  of  ability  who  comes 
within  his  sphere,  or  to  set  men  to  unsuitable  work. 
One  of  the  correspondents  of  the  home  press,  seeing  Sir 
Richard  at  work  in  the  famine  districts,  well  remarked 
that  nature  seemed  to  have  intended  him  for  the  com- 
mand of  a  great  army.  His  reticence  and  almost  taci- 
turnity struck  me  as  a  very  agreeable  variety  from  the 
pomposity  of  certain  Bombay  officials,  who  turned  up 
the  whites  of  their  eyes,  and  really  appeared  to  become 
ill,  when  any  one  whom  they  imagined  did  not  stand 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  55 

upon  their  own  fancied  level  spoke  to  them  consecutively 
for  half  a  minute.  Sir  Richard  does  not  imagine  that 
wisdom  of  every  kind,  or  even  a  knowledge  of  India,  is 
confined  to  his  own  bosom,  and  is  more  anxious  to  learn 
the  opinions  of  others  than  to  volunteer  his  own.  This 
is  a  very  frequent  characteristic  of  great  men  of  action  ; 
and  another  impression  which  they  leave,  and  one  he 
conveys,  is  that  of  possessing  a  large  fund  of  reserve 
power.  I  may  add  that,  like  Lord  Northbrook,  he 
practises  as  an  amateur  painter,  besides  having  time  to 
take  his  breakfast  ;  and  some  of  his  sketches  struck  me 
as  showing  a  very  remarkable  power  of  understanding 
and  artistically  reproducing  the  life  of  trees.  He  has 
also  done  much  to  promote  archaeological  research  in 
India,  and  almost  every  kind  of  intellectual  develop- 
ment. 

The  new  financial  member  of  Council  is  Sir  William 
Muir,  whom  I  have  already  alluded  to  in  his  position  as 
Governor  of  the  North-West  Provinces.  No  member  of 
the  Civil  Service  is  more  generally  respected,  or  could 
be  more  valuable  in  the  consultative  department  of  the 
Indian  Government.  An  accomplished  oriental  scholar, 
especially  in  Mohammedan  literature  and  history,  he  is 
equally  distinguished  as  an  administrator.  Though  Sir 
William  is  cautious,  and  what  is  called  "  a  safe  man," 
yet  as  a  Lieutenant-Governor  he  showed  that,  when  his 
ripe  judgment  was  convinced,  he  could  take  a  course  of 
his  own  in  direct  opposition  to  the  strong  tendencies  of 
the  Supreme  Government.  Notably  this  was  the  case 
in  regard  to  the  income-tax,  to  the  oppressive  working 
of  which  he  called  attention  in  the  most  effective  manner, 
at  a  time  when  the  higher  powers  were  determined  that 
it  should  appear  only  in  a  roseate  light.  In  the  North- 
West  Provinces,  however,  while  personally  liked,  much 
animosity    was    excited,    especially    among    non-official 


56  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Englishmen,  by  what  was  considered  -to  be  his  undue 
favouritism  towards  what  are  called  the  educated  natives 
I  was  somewhat  surprised  at  the  depth  and  fierceness 
of  the  resentment  which  had  thus  been  excited.  One 
man,  in  a  responsible  position,  went  so  far  as  to  say  that 
the  next  rebellion  in  India  would  be  on  the  part  of  the 
Europeans  and  Eurasians,  and  that,  when  such  a  move- 
ment arose,  every  English  soldier  who  had  been  six 
months  in  the  country  would  be  on  their  side.  This 
may  appear  very  absurd  to  Indian  officials,  who  know 
little  of  the  passions  raging  in  the  hearts  of  the  people 
round  them,  whether  natives  or  Europeans  ;  but  I  think 
there  is  something  in  it,  and  that  it  correctly  enough 
indicates  the  existence  of  feelings  which  are  not  without 
some  ground.  Another  remark  of  this  man,  who  was 
educated,  shrewd,  and  had  a  wide  and  varied  experience 
of  the  world,  is  worth  noting,  without  attaching  to  it 
more  importance  than  it  deserves.  He  said :  "  The 
civilians  think  that  India  was  made  for  themselves  and 
the  natives  alone,  and  it  is  becoming  every  day  more 
impossible  for  non-official  Englishmen  to  live  in  the 
country ;  but  the  natives  are  discovering  that  the  civilians 
are  quite  unnecessary  also,  and  it  will  end  in  our  all 
having  to  go  together — the  Englishmen  to  England,  and 
the  natives  to  massacre,  famine,  and  pestilence." 

Of  the  Commander-in-chief  in  India,  Lord  Napier  of 
Magdala,  it  would  be  difficult  to  write  in  terms  of  too 
high  praise.  His  capacities  as  a  soldier  are  well  known, 
having  been  abundantly  proved  in  India,  Abyssinia,  and 
China  ;  and  his  thoughtful  care  for  the  well-being  of  the 
troops  under  his  command,  and  great  consideration  for 
the  most  of  those  with  whom  he  comes  in  contact,  have 
made  him  hosts  of  friends.  I  say  "  the  most"  advisedly ; 
for  Lord  Napier  has  the  character  of  being  a  good  hater. 
Like  Lord  Northbrook  also,  he  has  a  very  keen  sense  in 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  57 

detecting  humbug  in  any  one — perhaps  too  keen  a  sense 
for  the  present  state  of  human  development—  and  is  apt 
to  act  upon  it  occasionally  in  a  manner  unpleasant  to 
the  person  in  whom  he  detects  it  ;  but  that  is  only  after 
he  has  made  up  his  mind  against  a  man.  I  had  come 
across  his  Excellency  before,  on  the  march  to  Peking, 
and  was  struck  by  his  vivid  recollection,  after  so  many 
years,  of  the  China  Englishmen  who  accompanied  the 
Peking  expedition,  and  by  his  happy  manner  of  sketch- 
ing off  their  peculiarities.  One  man  was  "always  pro- 
ducing dead  birds  out  of  his  innumerable  pockets  ;" 
another  "  had  a  way  of  disappearing  for  days  among 
the  Chinese,  and  throwing  the  whole  expedition  into 
anxiety  for  his  safety," — and  so  on.  Notwithstanding 
his  long  and  laborious  services  in  India,  there  seemed 
no  failing,  either  of  mental  power  or  physical  endurance, 
in  the  Commander-in-chief;  and  the  officers  at  Simla 
said  he  could  easily  take  the  field  again,  as  his  conduct 
at  the  camps  of  exercise  sufficiently  proved.  He  has 
the  eagle  eye  of  a  great  soldier,  and  when  he  retires  from 
India,  he  may  render  great  services  to  the  State  in  con- 
nection with  the  English  army  and  its  organisation.  I 
should  think  no  commander  ever  was  a  greater  favourite 
with  his  troops,  or  knew  them  better,  or  knew  better 
how  to  manage  them,  or  devoted  himself  to  their  wel- 
fare in  a  more  persistent  or  more  enlightened  manner. 
At  the  dinner  given  to  Lord  Napier  by  the  Anglo-- 
Indians  in  London,  on  the  occasion  of  his  having  been 
created  a  peer,  he  said,  in  effect,  and  almost  in  these 
words — "  I  landed  in  India  a  young  officer  of  Engineers, 
with  only  my  sword,  and  now  it  has  come  to  this." 
There  was  a  simplicity  and  an  honest  healthy  pride  in 
the  remark,  which  had  nothing  of  vanity  in  it.  I  have 
met  men  who  thought  that,  as  peerages  go;  he  had  got 
his  peerage  rather  easily  by  the  Abyssinian  war  ;  but  I 


5 8  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

never  heard  any  even  of  these  critics  grudge  it  to  him  in 
the  least.  It  is  true  that  the  China  war  of  i86d  was 
scarcely  less  difficult  or  brilliant,  and  was  productive  of 
more  important  results  ;  and  the  fact  that  Sir  Hope 
Grant  got  no  high  reward  for  his  skilful  and  humane 
conduct  of  it  goes  some  way  to  prove  that  Sir  Robert 
Napier  was  fortunate  in  the  time  and  circumstances  of 
his  Abyssinian  campaign  ;  but  he  was  under  a  great 
temptation  to  enter  on  that  campaign  without  the 
means  necessary  to  carry  it  to  a  successful  conclusion. 
Many  an  officer  would  have  snatched  at  the  opportunity 
without  stipulating  for  all  the  requisite  means  ;  and,  even 
as  it  was,  the  most  skilful  use  of  them  was  necessary  to 
accomplish  the  end  which  the  expedition  had  in  view,  if 
not  to  save  it  from  absolute  ruin.  It  should  be  borne  in 
mind,  also,  that  Lord  Napier's  command  in  Abyssinia 
was  only  the  last  of  a  series  of  brilliant  and  valuable 
services  which  had  commenced  almost  from  his  landing 
at  Calcutta,  fresh  from  Addiscombe,  forty-six  years  ago. 
In  the  battles  and  sieges  of  the  Panjab;  as  chief  engineer 
of  that  province,  when  so  much  had  to  be  done  upon 
its  transfer  to  English  rule  ;  as  chief  engineer  of  Lord 
Clyde's  army  during  the  Mutiny ;  in  the  pursuit  of 
Tantia  Topee  ;  in  China,  where  he  planned  the  capture 
of  the  Taku  Forts,  and  was  second  in  command  of  the 
expedition  ;  and  in  Bombay  as  Commander-in-chief, — 
the  officer  of  whom  I  write  had  rendered  services  which 
might  have  made  half  a  dozen  great  reputations  ;  so 
that,  even  as  peerages  go,  his  was  fully  due  by  the  time 
he  had  taken  the  heights  of  Magddla.  I  was  much 
indebted  to  his  Excellency  and  his  military  secretary, 
Colonel  Dillon,  for  maps,  advice,  &c,  in  regard  to  my 
Tibetan  journey  ;  and  their  genuine  kindness  of  disposi- 
tion at  once  established  confidence  and  gave  a  charm 
to  all  intercourse  with  them.     The  relationship  between 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  59 

these  two  distinguished  officers  has  been  a  long-  and 
close  one.  Colonel  Dillon's  popularity  is  somewhat 
diminished  by  the  fact  that  devotion  to  his  work  hardly 
allows  of  his  going-  into  society  ;  but  his  value  to  the 
Commander-in-chief,  and  to  the  Indian  army,  is  very 
great. 

Of  the  other  Simla  celebrities  whom  I  had  the  plea- 
sure to  meet  with  I  can  only  write  briefly.  Mr  C.  U. 
Aitchison,  the  Foreign  Secretary,  has  more  of  the  Euro- 
pean statesman  about  him  than  almost  any  other  Indian 
civilian  ;  and  one  cannot  fail  to  see  that  he  has  a  great 
deal  of  weight  of  brain,  and  of  that  quality  which  is 
most  easily  described  by  the  phrase  li  long-headedness." 
He  was  one  of  the  very  first  of  the  competition-wallahs. 
Some  very  excellent  men  came  forward  at  first  under 
the  competition  system,  and  continue  to  do  so  occasion- 
ally;  but  of  late  the  system  has  become  one  of  cram, 
and  the  best  men  from  the  universities  and  elsewhere 
are  chary  of  entering  into  a  competition  in  which  suc- 
cess can  only  be  hoped  for  by  disregarding  the  aims  and 
methods  of  a  liberal  education,  and  putting  one's  self 
under  a  system  of  mental  development  analogous  to  the 
physical  training  which  Strasburg  geese  are  compelled 
to  undergo.  Lord  Dalhousie,  who  had  a  keen  eye  for 
young  men  of  ability,  selected  Mr  Aitchison  as  his  pri- 
vate secretary  at  an  early  period  of  the  latter's  career, 
and  few  positions  can  afford  so  wide  and  complete  a 
view  of  the  methods  and  results  of  the  Indian  Govern- 
ment. The  heavy  crushing  work  of  the  Foreign  Office 
has  been  borne  by  Mr  Aitchison  in  a  manner  which 
proves  his  tenacity  of  purpose  and  strength  of  constitu- 
tion ;  but  there  is  too  much  reason  to  believe  that  its 
overwhelming  demands  had  undermined  the  strength  of 
Mr  Le  Poer  Wynne,  one  of  the  most  accomplished  and 
promising  of  the  younger  Indian  officials,  whose  sudden 


60  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

death,  a  few  months  ago,  deprived  Mr  Aitchison  of  one 
of  the  most  useful  and  valued  of  his  associates  in  the 
Foreign  Office.  Mr  Chapman,  the  Financial  Secretary, 
is  a  fine  specimen  of  the  bluff,  independent  English 
gentleman,  who  will  take  his  own  way  wherever  pos- 
sible, and  fearlessly  avow  and  carry  out  his  opinions. 
He  also  upheld  the  unhappy  income-tax;  but  in  other 
questions  his  usually  sound  judgment  and  independence 
of  character  have  proved  most  useful,  especially  in  the 
stand  he  has  made  against  the  Ritualists — or  Anglo- 
Catholics,  as  they  prefer  to  be  called — who  had  become 
more  daring  and  triumphant  in  India  than  they  had  ever 
been  in  England.  Mr  Forsyth,  when  I  was  at  Simla, 
was  preparing  for  his  second  Yarkund  mission,  and  I 
did  no  more  than  make  his  acquaintance,  but  was  struck 
by  a  certain  lofty  protesting  manner  he  had;  for  he  was 
still  under  the  cloud  of  the  Kuka  executions,  and  of  the 
sentence  of  removal  from  his  commissionership,  and  of 
general  disapproval  of  his  conduct  in  connection  with 
the  Kukas,  passed  upon  him  by  the  Government  of 
India,  when  its  ruling  spirit  was  Sir  John  Strachey,  in 
the  period  between  the  Viceroyships  of  Lord  Mayo  and 
Lord  Northbrook.  The  ex-commissioner,  however,  has 
now  performed  his  pilgrimage  ;  he  has  washed  away 
his  sins,  real  or  alleged,  in  the  sacred  waters  of  the 
Yangi  Hissar,  and,  as  Sir  Thomas  Forsyth,  clothed  in  the 
garments  of  a  Knight  of  the  Star  of  India,  he  can  move 
again  freely  in  the  arena  of  Indian  politics.  I  saw  a 
good  deal  more  of  the  lamented  Dr  Stolicza,  and  well 
remember  his  saying,  in  a  common  foreign  idiom,  "  I 
am  awfully  glad  that  I  have  been  allowed  to  go  to  Yar- 
kund." He  was  destined  never  to  return  from  the  sterile 
regions  of  Central  Asia  ;  but  perhaps,  as  human  life 
goes,  even  that  was  a  reason  for  being  glad.  I  was  sur- 
prised to  find  so  youthful  a  figure  in  the  vir  sapiens, 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  61 

doctissimus,  Dr  W.  W.  Hunter,  who  has  been  harassing 
the  souls  of  Indian  officials  and  editors  by  his  system 
of  spelling,  which,  however,  is  his  only  in  that  he  has 
modified  a  long  existent  system,  practically  applied  it, 
and  carried  it  out  for  the  Government.  This  gentleman  is 
as  agreeable  in  society  as  in  his  charming  books,  and  it 
is  only  to  be  regretted  that  he  does  not  trust  more 
entirely  to  his  culture  and  talents  for  both  social  and 
official  success.  Major  Fenwick,  the  journalist,  who 
makes  Simla  his  headquarters,  is  a  man  of  bold,  inde- 
pendent spirit,  with  an  immense  amount  of  humour,  a 
lively  imagination,  and  great  literary  knowledge.  In 
the  Rev.  John  Fordyce,  of  the  Union  Church,  I  found 
an  old  friend,  who  had  created  a  high  reputation  for 
himself  by  his  combination  of  prudence  and  zeal.  Nor 
can  I  omit  to  make  mention  of  Mr  Edmund  Downes, 
whose  courageous  attempt  to  reach  Kafiristan  in  dis- 
guise had  brought  him  into  public  notice  ;  and  of  two 
Bombay  officers,  Colonels  Ker  and  Farquharson,  who 
did  a  great  deal  to  make  my  stay  at  Simla  agreeable. 

The  hill  on  which  Simla  is  situated  was  first  made 
known  by  the  visit  to  it  in  1817  of  the  brothers  Gerard, 
two  Scotch  officers  who  were  engaged  in  the  survey  of 
the  Sutlej  valley  ;  and  the  first  house  was  built  upon  it 
in  1822  by  the  political  agent  of  the  district.  About 
that  latter  year  it  was  purchased,  by  exchange,  by  the 
British  Government,  from  the  Rana  of  Keonthul,  and 
made  into  a  regular  sanitarium.  The  first  Governor- 
General  who  visited  it  was  Lord  Amherst,  in  1827. 
Jacquemont  described  it  as  having  sixty  houses  for 
Europeans  in  1831;  and  Lord  Auckland  was  the  first 
Governor-General  to  spend  a  summer  there — that  of 
1S41.  The  annexation  of  the  Panjab  gave  a  great  im- 
petus to  the  development  of  this  hill-station.  Lord 
Dalhousie  liked  to  establish   the   headquarters   of   his 


62  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

government  there  in  summer,  because  that  allowed  him 
to  reside  much  during  the  rains  in  the  drier  region  of 
Chini,  which  suited  his  health.  Lord  Lawrence  accepted 
the  Viceroyship  on  the  express  condition  that  he  should 
be  allowed  to  spend  the  summer  on  the  hills,  Simla 
being  the  most  convenient  spot ;  and  thus  the  arrange- 
ment has  continued,  except  that  the  exigencies  .of  the 
Bengal  famine  have  led  the  Supreme  Government  to 
remain  in  Calcutta  this  year.  In  the  height  of  the 
season  Simla  has  now  usually  a  population  of  about 
fifteen  hundred  Europeans,  and  as  many  thousand 
natives.  In  a  former  chapter  I  have  briefly  described  its 
general  appearance  and  surrounding  scenery.  One  of 
its  drawbacks  is  a  deficiency  in  the  supply  of  water; 
but  this  might  easily  be  remedied  at  some  expense, 
and  probably  would  be  if  the  house-proprietors  were 
assured  that  the  Supreme  Government  intended  to  con- 
tinue its  summer  residence  there  ;  though*  I  do  not 
quite  see  how  that  doubt  should  be  allowed  to  have  so 
much  influence,  because  many  of  them  argue  that  the 
example  of  Masuri  has  shown  that  Simla  might  flourish 
even  if  it  were  unvisited  by  any  Government,  and  might 
thus  secure  a  less  uncertain  income.  The  permanent 
residents  of  the  place  are  enthusiastic  in  their  praises  of 
its  winter  climate,  and  that  is  really  the  only  season 
of  the  year  in  which  Simla  is  calculated  to  do  much 
positive  good  to  invalids,  the  cold  then  not  being  ex- 
treme, while  the  air  is  still  dry,  and  both  invigora- 
ting and  exhilarating  ;  but  it  is  as  a  retreat  in  the  hot 
weather  of  April  and  May,  and  of  the  rains,  that  it  is 
most  used,  and  I  do  not  know  that  much  can  be  said  in 
its  praise  as  a  sanitarium  during  that  long  season.  Of 
course  it  is  a  great  thing  to  escape  from  the  fiery  heat 
of  the  Indian  plains  in  April  and  May,  and  from  their 
muggy    oppressive  warmth  during   the  five  succeeding 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  63 

months  ;  but  that  is  about  the  extent  of  the  sanitary- 
advantages  of  Simla  in  summer,  and  the  climate  then 
has  serious  drawbacks  of  its  own.  I  derived  no  benefit' 
from  it,  nor  did  any  of  the  invalids  there  with  whom  I 
was  acquainted  ;  and  its  effects  upon  some  of  them  were 
such  that  they  had  to  leave  before  the  stay  they  had 
marked  out  for  themselves  had  been  accomplished.  In 
May  the  climate  was  exceedingly  changeable,  being 
sometimes  oppressively  hot,  but  for  the  most  part  cold 
and  damp,  with  thick  mists  and  fierce  storms  of  thunder 
and  rain.  And  when  the  great  rains  of  the  south-west 
monsoon  set  in  upon  Simla,  there  must  be  few  invalids 
indeed  for  whom  it  can  be  a  suitable  place  of  residence ; 
and  I  should  think  at  that  season,  or  for  nearly  four 
months  of  the  year,  a  state  of  almost  robust  health 
must  be  necessary  in  order  to  derive  benefit  or  enjoy- 
ment from  a  stay  there.  It  would  be  well  if  more 
invalids  at  that  season  followed  the  example  of  the 
great  Lord  Dalhousie  and  went  up  to  Chini,  or  to  some 
other  place,  where  they  are  close  to  eternal  snow, -and 
are  protected  by  a  snowy  range  from  the  Indian  mon- 
soon. 

Whether  the  traveller  be  in  search  of  health,  or 
sport,  or  sublime  scenery,  there  is  no  other  place  from 
which  he  can  have  such  convenient  access  as  Simla  to 
the  interior  of  the  Himaliya,  and  to  the  dry  elevated 
plains  of  Central  Asia.  Routes  proceed  from  it  up  to 
Chinese  Tibet  on  the  east  ;  to  Ladak  and  the  upper 
Indus  valley;  beyond  Ladak  to  the  Karakorum  Moun- 
tains and  Yarkund  ;  to  Spiti,  Lahaul,  Zanskar,  and  all 
the  elevated  provinces  of  the  Western  Himaliya;  to 
Chamba  and  all  the  other  hill-states  to  the  north-west ; 
and  to  Kashmir,  Little  Tibet,  Gilgit  Yassin,  and  the 
"Roof  of  the  World"  itself.  Indeed,  now  that  the 
Russians  have  established  a  post-office  at  Kashgar,  it 


64  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


would  be  quite  possible,  and  tolerably  safe,  to  walk 
from  Simla  to  St  Petersburg,  or  to  the  mouth  of  the 
Amur  on  the  Pacific  coast.  Those  who  wish  parti- 
cularly to  know  what  can  be  done  from  Simla  will  do 
well  to  examine  the  "  Route  Map  for  the  Western  Hima- 
liyas,  Kashmir,  Panjab,  and  Northern  India,"  compiled 
by  Major  Montgomerie  of  the  Great  Trigonometrical 
Survey  of  India.  In  the  appendix  to  this  map  he  gives 
no  less  than  sixty-three  routes,  almost  all  of  which 
either  proceed  from  Simla,  or  are  connected  with  it  by 
intervening  routes.  It  will  soon  be  seen,  from  the 
Major's  remarks  on  these  various  routes,  that  the  travel- 
ler in  the  Himaliya  must  lay  aside  his  ordinary  ideas  as 
to  roads  and  house  accommodation.  Such  references  as 
the  following  to  the  roads  and  halting-places  for  the 
night,  occur  with  a  frequency  which  is  rather  alarming  to 
the  uninitiated  :  "  No  supplies  ;  "  "  ditto,  and  no  fuel ;" 
"  cross  three  miles  of  glacier  ;"  "  very  bad  road  ;  "  "  ditto, 
and  no  supplies  ;  "  "  road  impassable  for  ponies  ;  "  rope 
bridge  ;"  "cross  the  river  twice — very  difficult  to  ford;" 
"  Kirghiz  summer  camp — yaks,  &c,  supplied  ; "  "  site  of 
a  deserted  village  ;"  "  muddy  water  only  can  be  got  by 
digging  holes  ;"  "grass  doubtful,  no  fuel  ;  "  "ford  river, 
water  up  to  waist ;"  "  cross  river  on  mussaks  ;"  "  gene- 
rally a  Tartar  or  Boti  camp;"  "cross  the  Tagalank 
Pass,  18,042  feet;"  and  "cross  several  torrents." 

The  great  routes  from  Simla  are  those  which  lead 
to  Chinese  Tibet,  to  Ladak,  and  to  Kashmir,  and  run 
from  north-east  to  north-west.  The  road  towards 
Chinese  Tibet,  at  least  as  far  as  Chini  and  Pangay  in 
the  Sutlej  valley,  is  that  which  is  most  affected  by 
tourists,  because  it  is  a  cut  road  on  which  a  jJiampan 
can  be  carried,  and  because  it  has  bungalows  which 
were  constructed  for  the  road  engineers,  and  are  avail- 
able for  all  European  travellers.      Shipki    in   Chinese 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  65 

Tibet  is  only  about  eight  marches  beyond  Pangay,  but 
the  road  is  so  dreadful  that  few  travellers  care  to  go 
beyond  the  latter  place  ;  and  those  who  do,  avoid  the 
Chinese  border  and  turn  northward  towards  Leh  in 
Ladak  by  Hango,  Lio,  the  Parangla  Pass,  and  the 
Tsho  Morari  Lake.  There  is  a  more  direct  route 
from  Simla  to  Leh,  along  a  cut  road  or  bridle-path, 
through  the  Kiilu  valley,  over  the  Rotang  Pass,  and 
then  through  Lahaul,  and  over  the  Barra  Lacha  Pass. 
The  directest  route  from  Simla  to  Kashmir  is  that  by 
way  of  Belaspur,  Kangra,  Badrawar,  and  the  Braribal 
Pass,  and  occupies  only  about  thirty-one  marches  ;  but 
it  is  rather  uninteresting,  and  enterprising  travellers 
prefer  to  go  round  by  Leh,  or  to  follow  some  of  the 
many  ways  there  are  of  passing  through  the  sublimer 
scenery  of  the  Himaliya. 

It  is  comparatively  easy  to  go  from  Simla  direct, 
either  to  Chinese  Tibet  or  to  Kashmir;  but  to  take 
in  both  these  termini  in  one  journey  is  a  more  difficult 
problem.  That  was  what  I  wished  to  accomplish,  and 
to  have  come  down  again  from  the  Chinese  border 
towards  Simla,  and  then  gone  up  to  Kashmir  by  one 
of  the  directer  routes  would  have  brought  me  into  the 
region  of  the  Indian  monsoon  at  a  season  when  it  was 
at  its  height,  and  when  it  would  have  rendered  hill  tra- 
velling almost  impossible  for  me.  What  then  seemed 
the  proper  thing  for  me  to  do,  after  touching  the  terri- 
tory of  the  Grand  Lama,  was  to  keep  as  high  up  as 
possible  among  the  inner  Himaliya,  and  to  see  if  I 
could  reach  Kashmir  in  that  way,  without  descending 
either  into  hot  or  rainy  regions.  I  could  not  get  any 
information  as  to  considerable  portions  of  my  proposed 
march ;  but,  as  it  turned  out,  I  was  able  to  go  all  the 
way  from  Shipki  in  Chinese  Tibet  to  the  Sind  valley 
in  upper  Kashmir,  along  the  whole  line  of  the  Western 


66  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


Himaliya,  if  not  exactly  over  the  tops  of  them,  yet 
something  very  like  that,  through  a  series  of  elevated 
valleys,  for  the  most  part  about  12,000  feet  high,  with 
passes  ranging  up  to  18,000  feet.  Thus,  passing 
through  Hangrang,  Spiti,  Lahaul,  Zanskar,  Suni,  and 
Dras,  I  never  required  to  descend  below  10,000  feet, 
and  very  seldom  below  12,000;  and,  though  travelling 
in  the  months  of  the  Indian  monsoon,  I  met  with 
hardly  any  rain,  and  enjoyed  a  most  bracing  and  ex- 
hilarating climate,  together  with  the  great  privilege  of 
beholding  the  wildest,  sublimest  scenery  of  the  Hima- 
liya, and  making  acquaintance  with  the  most  secluded 
and  primitive  of  its  people. 

I  must  hurry  on,  however,  to  the  events  of  my  own 
journey;  but  before  treating  of  them,  it  may  be  well,  in 
order  to  make  these  events  intelligible,  to  say  some- 
thing about  what  is  necessary  for  travellers  in  the 
Himaliya.  Journeying  among  these  giant  mountains  is 
a  somewhat  serious  business,  and  yet  it  is  not  so  serious 
as  it  probably  appears  to  those  who  have  had  no  ex- 
perience of  it.  In  Switzerland,  when  essaying  icy  peaks 
and  crossing  snowy  passes,  we  never  get  farther  off  than 
a  day  or  two  from  some  grand  hotel,  where  all  the  com- 
forts, and  many  of  the  luxuries,  of  civilisation  are  to  be 
found;  and  even  then  considerable  preparations  have 
to  be  made  for  remaining  two  or  three  days  beyond 
human  habitations,  and  for  sleeping  in  a  cave  or  hollow 
of  the  rock.  But  for  a  journey  like  mine,  in  the  inner 
Himaliya,  extending  over  months,  the  preparations 
which  have  to  be  made  are  of  rather  an  alarming  kind. 
House,  furniture,  kitchen,  cooking-pots,  bed,  bedding,  a 
certain  proportion  of  our  food,  and  all  our  potables,  ex- 
cept water,  have  to  be  carried  with  us,  for  the  most  of 
the  way  on  the  shoulders  of  men  or  women;  and,  in  my 
case,  the  affair  was   complicated   by  my  having  to  be 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  67 

carried  also  ;  for,  at  starting,  I  was  unable  to  walk  a 
hundred  yards,  or  to  mount  a  horse.  Almost  no  bun- 
galows were  to  be  met  with  beyond  the  first  fourteen 
marches  up  to  Pangay  ;  in  a  considerable  portion  of  the 
country  to  be  traversed  the  people  will  not  allow  Euro- 
peans to  occupy  their  houses — and  even  if  they  did, 
motives  of  comfort  and  health  would  dictate  a  tent,  ex- 
cept in  very  severe  weather;  for  the  houses  are  ex- 
tremely dirty  and  ill-ventilated,  and  the  mountaineers 
are  covered  with  vermin.  Of  course,  too,  one  is  far 
more  independent  in  a  tent ;  and  there  is  no  comparison 
between  the  open  camp,  under  trees,  or  the  protection 
of  some  great  rock,  and  a  low-roofed,  dark,  unventi- 
lated,  dirty  room  alive  with  insects. 

A  tent,  then,  is  the  first  necessity  to  look  after,  and 
that  matter  is  much  simplified  by  the  fact  that,  there 
being  almost  no  level  ground  in  the  Himaliya,  it  is 
useless  taking  any  tent  but  one  of  very  small  dimen- 
sions. The  tremendous  slopes  and  precipices  of  these 
mountains  were  not  made  for  the  large  canvas  houses 
which  Indian  officials  carry  about  with  them  on  the 
plains.  I  have  travelled  for  a  whole  day  before  finding 
a  piece  of  level  ground  the  size  of  an  ordinary  drawing- 
room,  and  have  had  to  pitch  my  tent  in  such  a  place, 
that  two  steps  from  my  own  door  would  have  carried 
me  over  a  precipice — a  position  evidently  unsuited  for 
somnambulists,  and  for  travellers  of  a  very  convivial 
turn  of  mind.  Fortunately,  when  I  told  Lord  Napier 
of  Magdala  of  my  intended  journey,  he  said  to  me, 
"  Have  you  got  a  tent  yet?  No.  Then  don't  get  one 
till  you  see  the  tent  which  I  used  in  Abyssinia."  This 
historical  tent  he  kindly  had  pitched  for  me,  and  I  got 
a  facsimile  of  it  made  in  Simla  at  the  exceedingly 
reasonable  price  of  70  rupees  (about  £j),  my  butler 
being-  a  great  hand  at  making;  bargains.     It  was  made 


68  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO  IV. 

of  American  drill,  with  a  double  fly,  which  was  invalu- 
able for  keeping  off  rain  and  heat.  Its  floor,  and  up  to 
where  the  roof  began  to  slope,  at  three  feet  from  the 
ground,  was  about  eleven  feet  by  nine,  and  its  extreme 
height  between  seven  and  eight  feet.  It  was  supported 
by  two  upright  bamboos  and. a  bamboo  across  them  fit- 
ting on  iron  spikes.  Properly  speaking,  it  had  no  walls, 
but  ropes  attached  to  the  outside  of  the  inner  fly,  about 
three  feet  from  the  ground,  gave  it  a  perpendicular  fall 
of  that  height.  It  had  not  a  pyramidal,  but  a  very  blunt 
wedge-like  form ;  and  the  cloth  of  both  front  and  back 
opened  completely  from  the  top  to  the  ground,  or  could 
be  kept  quite  closed  by  means  of  small  hooks,  while  in 
both  back  and  front  there  was  a  small  upper  window, 
with  a  flap  to  cover  it.  This  habitation  was  so  light 
that  one  man  could  carry  it  and  the  bamboos,  while  its 
iron  pegs  were  not  a  sufficient  load  for  one  coolie,  and 
it  was  wonderfully  roomy — more  so  than  tents  of  much 
greater  dimensions  and  of  more  imposing  appearance. 
It  was  a  convenience,  as  well  as  a  source  of  safety,  to 
be  able  to  get  in  and  out  of  it  at  both  sides  without 
stooping  down  ;  and  its  coolness,  and  its  use  as  a  pro- 
tection from  the  sun,  were  greatly  enhanced  by  its 
allowing  of  either  or  both  ends  being  thrown  entirely 
open.  I  never  fell  in  with  any  tent,  except  the  model 
on  which  it  was  made,  to  be  compared  with  it  for  com- 
bined lightness  and  comfort,  and  I  have  seldom  found 
so  pleasant  a  habitation.  It  is  necessary  to  have  iron 
pegs  for  such  a  tent,  owing  to  the  nature  of  the  ground 
and  the  scarcity  of  wood  in  the  high  mountains  ;  and  a 
double  supply  of  bamboos  should  also  be  taken.  A 
good  thick  piece  of  carpet,  about  three  and  a  half  feet 
long  by  two  and  a  half  broad,  is  a  great  comfort, 
especially  on  snow.  All  jimcrack  articles  are  utterly 
useless    for    the    Himaliya,    because    everything    gets 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  69 


knocked  about  in  a  fearful  manner  ;  and  as  a  good 
night's  rest  is  of  the  utmost  importance,  I  got  Messrs 
Cotton  &  Morris  of  Simla  to  make  for  me  specially  one 
of  their  travelling-cots  which  take  to  pieces.  It  was 
composed  of  two  short  and  two  long  poles  of  strong 
wood,  which  went  into  sockets  in  four  thick  strong 
wooden  legs.  When  this  was  set  up,  a  piece  of  strong 
carpet  was  stretched  over  it  tightly  in  a  peculiar  way, 
which  I  have  not  space  to  describe.  My  table,  which 
could  also  be  taken  to  pieces,  weighed  only  a  few 
pounds  ;  and  I  took  with  me  a  light  cane  chair,  which 
could  always  be  mended  with  string,  twigs,  or  some- 
thing or  other  ;  but  a  folding  Kashmir  chair  would  have 
been  much  better.  These  things,  with  washing  ap- 
paratus, a  couple  of  resais  or  padded  quilts,  a  plaid,  and 
a  waterproof  sheet,  were  quite  sufficient  to  start  me  in 
Himaliyan  life  so  far  as  my  residence  was  concerned. 
Some  travellers  take  portable  iron  stoves  with  them  for 
their  tents,  but  I  rather  think  the  heat  thus  obtained 
unfits  one  for  bearing  the  cold  to  which  we  are  neces- 
sarily exposed.  My  tent  allowed  of  a  fire  being 
kindled  close  to  the  entrance,  when  wood  could  be  had, 
and  I  found  it  was  only  the  damp  cold  of  regions  with 
plenty  of  wood  that  was  injurious.  For  my  servants  I 
had  a  good  rauti  of  thick  lined  cloth,  which  kept  them 
quite  comfortable ;  and  I  cut  down  their  supply  of 
cooking-pots  and  personal  luggage  as  far  as  was  at  all 
compatible  with  their  comfort  and  mine. 

As  regards  provisions  in  the  inner  and  higher  Hima- 
liya,  the  traveller  will  find  that  there  are  juniper- 
berries  growing  nearly  as  high  as  he  is  likely  to  camp, 
edible  pines  up  to  about  I2,ooo  feet,  and  apricots  nearly 
to  io,OCO.  Wherever  there  are  villages,  milk,  mutton, 
and  coarse  flour  of  various  kinds  are  to  be  had  ;  but 
that  practically  exhausts  the  list  of  Himaliyan  supplies, 


70  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

except  for  the  sportsman  ;  and,  on  a  long  journey, 
human  stomachs  desiderate  a  greater  variety.  The 
junipers  are  of  immense  size  and  powerful  flavour  ;  but 
most  people  prefer  to  have  their  junipers  by  way  of 
Holland  or  Geneva.  There  is  prime  mutton  to  be  had 
in  all  parts  of  the  mountains,  not  to  speak  of  shaggy 
sheep  about  the  size  of  reindeer ;  but  the  acute  hillmen 
are  by  no  means  fond  of  parting  with  it,  and  are  apt  to 
insist  that  they  have  nothing  else  to  offer  you,  either 
for  love  or  money,  except  a  fleshless  lamb — evidently 
destined,  even  by  nature,  to  an  early  doom — or  an 
ancient  ram  which  has  been  used  for  years  as  a  carrier 
of  burdens.  As  to  milk,  it  is  an  innocent  and  excellent 
article  of  food  ;  and  those  whose  stomachs  dislike  it 
when  sweet,  can  follow  the  example  of  milk-drinking 
nations,  and  take  it  when  it  is  sour  and  curdled,  thus 
saving  their  stomachs  a  good  deal  of  trouble  ;  but  it 
takes  at  least  six  quarts  of  milk  daily  to  afford  very 
scanty  sustenance  to  a  full-grown  man,  and  by  the  time 
the  traveller  begins  upon  the  fourth  bottle,  he  is  apt  to 
wish  that  it  were  something  else;  and  I  suspect  that, 
in  these  circumstances,  and  when  seated  on  a  bank  of 
snow,  even  the  sternest  teetotaller  would  not  be  averse 
to  mingling  a  little  rum  with  his  milk.  The  flour  to  be 
had  is  often  very  bad,  being  ill  ground  and  mixed  with 
dirt ;  so  it  is  expedient  both  to  have  some  fine  Euro- 
pean flour,  and  when  we  meet  with  good  mountain 
flour,  to  take  some  of  it  on  with  us  for  the- next  few 
stages.  Perhaps  the  best  article  of  this  kina  to  be  got 
is  the  roasted  barley  flour  which  the  hillmen  take  with 
them  on  their  journeys,  and  which,  with  the  aid  of  only 
a  little  salt  and  cold  water,  they  make  into  a  very 
eatable  dough  called  suttu.  The  sportsman,  however, 
can  supply  his  pot  with  many  tempting  edibles.  I 
know  of  no  flesh  equal  to  that  of  the  ibex  ;  and  the 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  71 

navo,  a  species  of  gigantic  antelope  of  Chinese  Tibet, 
with  the  barra-singk,  a  red  deer  of  Kashmir,  are  nearly 
equally  good.  Though  these  animals  are  difficult  to 
get  at,  yet  portions  of  them  can  sometimes  be  obtained 
from  native  shikarries  ;  and  my  Bombay  servant,  with 
his  gun,  supplied  me  with  many  pheasants  and  par- 
tridge-— of  which  the  Himaliya  can  boast  the  most 
splendid  variety — and  with  any  quantity  of  large,  fat, 
blue  pigeons,  of  which  there  are  great  flocks  wherever 
there  is  a  village  with  grain-fields  round  it.  All  the 
way  from  Kotgarh,  four  or  five  marches  from  Simla,  to 
Chinese  Tibet,  and  from  thence  to  Siiru,  a  dependency 
of  Kashmir,  I  did  not  find  a  single  domestic  fowl,  and 
felt  much  the  want  of  eggs.  Colonel  Moore  and  Cap- 
tain de  Roebeck,  whom  I  met  at  Kotgarh  on  their  way 
back  from  Spiti,  spoke  of  having  made  the  acquain- 
tance, in  that  province,  of  some  very  bony  fowls,  which 
required  to  be  pounded  with  rocks  in  order  to  make 
them  eatable  ;  but  I  believe  these  gentlemen  must  have 
eaten  up  all  the  fowls  of  Spiti,  and  put  an  end  to  the 
breed.  Both  the  Hindu  Kunaits  and  the  Lama  Bud- 
hists  object  on  religious  grounds  to  supplying  travellers 
with  eggs  and  fowls ;  so  it  is  not  till  one  gets  to 
Mohammedan  Kashmir  that  these  useful  articles  of  diet 
are  to  be  met  with.  Also,  till  near  Kashmir  the 
streams  are  far  too  muddy,  rapid,  and  difficult  of  ap- 
proach, to  afford  fish,  though  one  traveller  in  a  hundred 
may  have  some  offered  to  him.  A  species  of  turnip  is 
to  be  found  at  some  villages,  and  potatoes  and  various 
vegetables  are  grown  by  the  Moravian  missionaries  at 
Kaelang  in  Lahaul,  and  Pu  in  upper  Kunawar;  but 
practically,  as  I  have  said,  the  traveller  will  find  that  he 
has  nothing  to  depend  upon  except  milk,  mutton, 
coarse  flour,  edible  pines,  apricots,  and  junipers.  The 
want  of  vegetables  is  most  severely  felt,  owing  to  the 


72  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


acids  which  they  supply  ;  but  I  found  that  dried  apri- 
cots were  an  excellent  substitute  for  them,  especially 
the  dried  apricots  of  Baltistan,  which  are  highly  valued 
by  the  hillmen,  and  may  be  purchased  from  parties  of 
Balti's,  or  from  the  wealthier  zemindars.  The  kernels  of 
their  seeds  also  are  quite  eatable,  and,  taken  with  the 
dried  flesh  of  the  apricot,  make  a  combination  not  un- 
like that  of  almonds  and  raisins.  It  is  well,  however, 
to  take  a  certain  amount  of  compressed  vegetables  on  a 
long  journey  into  the  Himaliya,  and  tins  of  soup  con- 
taining vegetables  will  be  found  useful.  Hotch-potch 
especially  is  of  the  greatest  service,  because  by  itself  it 
affords  a  sufficient  and  comfortable  meal,  and  it  stood 
me  in  good  stead  when  my  people  were  all  too  much 
fatigued  to  have  prepared  any  more  elaborate  dinner. 
There  is,  in  fact,  nothing  like  hotch-potch  for  the 
Himaliyan  traveller;  the  only  objections  to  it  are  its 
weight  and  bulk,  when  tins  have  to  be  carried  by  coolies 
for  months.  This  difficulty  I  partially  met  by  taking 
with  me  a  quantity  of  the  soupe  a  rognoft  au  gras  of 
MM.  U sines  Chollet  et  Cie.  of  Paris.  This  soup,  which 
as  its  name  indicates,  is  composed  of  onions  and  rich 
meat,  is  in  small  oblong  tins  about  the  cubic  capacity 
of  an  ordinary  soup  tin  of  one  pound  weight.  Each  tin 
contains  thirty  portions  of  soup  in  tablet?,  which  only 
require  to  have  boiling  water  poured  upon  them,  in 
order  to  make  a  nourishing  and  very  palatable  soup.  I 
scarcely  think  one  portion  will  make  a  sufficient  basin 
of  soup  as  one  takes  soup  on  a  journey,  but  one  and  a 
half  will  ;  so  that  a  single  tin,  which  might  be  carried 
in  an  outer  pocket,  provides  a  single  traveller  with 
abundance  of  soup  for  his  dinner  for  twenty  days;  and 
I  had  one  tin  open  for  thirty- six  days  in  August  and 
September,  when  it  had  to  go  through  a  good  deal  of 
heat,  without  the  last  tablet  used   being  in   the  least 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  73 

spoiled.  Onion  soup,  I  may  mention,  has  been  found 
of  great  use  by  Arctic  expeditions  in  the  extreme  cold 
to  which  they  are  exposed.  The  few  tins  of  preserved 
meat  I  took  with  me  were  of  little  use,  for  one  wants 
more  particularly  to  supplement  the  local  supplies  with 
light  articles  of  diet ;  but  an  exception  should  be  made 
in  favour  of  tins  of  half-boiled  bacon,  which  are  exceed- 
ingly acceptable  in  high  cold  regions.  Tins  of  salmon 
are  a  great  stand-by,  being  invaluable  for  affording  a 
substantial  cold  breakfast  at  the  mid-day  halt,  when 
the  traveller  is  as  hungry  as  a  hunter,  and  when,  if  he 
gives  way  to  his  inclinations,  a  pound  tin  will  disappear 
before  him  in  a  few  minutes.  Tins  of  fresh  white  fish, 
and  of  any  uncompressed  vegetables,  except,  perhaps, 
peas,  are  of  no  use  ;  but  Finnan  or  Findon  haddocks 
are,  with  boiled  fowl  and  small  tins  of  potted  meat,  and 
of  sardines  preserved  in  butter.  But  it  is  evident  that 
we  are  thus  in  danger  of  running  up  a  train  of  fifty 
coolies,  at  least  at  starting,  and  it  was  only  by  the 
greatest  care,  both  in  choosing  and  in  using  these  sup- 
plies, that  I  was  able  to  start  with  little  more  than  two 
coolies'  loads  of  tins,  and  yet  to  keep  coming  and  going 
on  them  for  months.  Skill  of  this  kind  can  only  be 
obtained  by  experience  in  travel,  and  it  is  essential,  in 
order  to  make  the  supplies  go  any  distance,  peremp- 
torily to  forbid  one's  servants  to  open  a  single  tin  with- 
out express  permission. 

As  twenty  full  quart  bottles  are  about  a  coolie's  load, 
it  is  advisable  to  be  as  discriminating  in  the  selection 
and  use  of  potables  as  of  edibles  on  a  Himaliyan 
journey.  Wine,  to  any  extent,  and  beer,  are  out  of  the 
question  ;  for  it  must  be  remembered  that  it  is  some- 
times difficult  to  get  even  the  dozen  coolies  which  are 
required  to  carry  one's  tent  and  other  necessaries  ;  and 
the   duty   of  bigdr,   or  carriage,  presses  so  heavily  at 


74  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

times  on  the  villages  of  the  Himaliya,  that  it  is  but 
right  for  the  humane  traveller  to  avail  himself  of  it  as 
lightly  as  he  can.  Those  who  usually  conform  to  the 
ordinary  habits  of  civilised  life,  which  are  very  well 
adapted  for  brain  work  and  for  sedentary  habits,  will  be 
surprised  to  find  how  easily  they  can  conform  to  a 
simpler  regime  in  the  Himaliya;  for  in  the  keen  stimu- 
lating air  of  these  mountains  there  is  not  only  very  little 
need  for  alcoholic  stimulants,  but  also  very  little  desire 
for  them. 

However  perfect  our  other  arrangements  may  be, 
there  will  be  little  comfort  on  a  long  mountain  journey 
without  exceptionally  good  servants,  who  will  enter  a 
little  into  the  spirit  of  the  journey  ;  and  it  is  exceed- 
ingly difficult  to  get  Indian  servants  who  will  do  any- 
thing of  the  kind.  As  a  rule,  they  do  not  like  travelling, 
unless  it  be  in  the  comfort  and  state  of  a  Commis- 
sioner's or  Collector's  camp;  and  they  have  a  great 
dread  of  cold  regions  in  general,  and  of  snowy  moun- 
tains in  particular.  The  consequence  is,  it  is  difficult  to 
get  respectable  servants  to  go  up  into  the  mountains  ; 
and  Simla  is  famous  for  its  bad  servants;  though  I 
noticed  that  almost  every  station  I  came  to  deemed 
itself  more  unfortunate  in  that  respect  than  its  neigh- 
bours. The  plague  of  servants,  everywhere  consider- 
able, has  now  become  very  serious  in  India.  There  has 
been  no  legislation  of  late  years  on  this  subject  adapted 
to  the  circumstances  of  the  country;  and  old  arbitrary 
practices  for  keeping  servants  in  order  can  be  very 
rarely  resorted  to,  and  are  not  in  themselves  desirable. 
There  has  been  too  little  care  taken  in  valuing  good 
servants,  and  too  little  trouble  in  having  bad  ones 
punished.  The  native  Indian  journals  have  some 
reason  on  their  side  when  they  argue  that,  if  we  are 
afflicted   with   very  bad  servants,  the  fault  is  much  our 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  75 

own,  inasmuch  as  we  have  made  them  what  they  are. 
I  notice,  however,  that  the  earliest  accounts  of  Anglo- 
Indian  life  speak  of  two  very  different  types  of  ser- 
vants, very  much  corresponding-  to  the  two  great  types 
of  the  present  day.  The  misfortune  is,  that  since  the 
Mutiny  the.  number  of  servants  of  the  good  type  has 
decreased,  principally  owing  to  our  lessened  family 
interest  in  India;  while  the  bad  servants  have  found 
increased  immunity  under  the  almost  necessary  but 
overdone  protection  of  legal  equality  with  their  masters, 
and  with  the  greater  opportunities  which  they  now  pos- 
sess of  moving  from  station  to  station,  and  of  employ- 
ing each  other's  or  forged  certificates.  But  there  are 
very  good  servants  to  be  had  still  in  India,  and  care 
should  be  taken  not  to  confound  them  with  the  rascals, 
or  to  treat  them  with  harshness  and  distrust.  On  this 
Himaliyan  journey  I  was  singularly  fortunate.  About 
a  year  before,  after  having  been  afflicted  with  some  of 
the  worst  servants  to  be  found  anywhere — men  whose 
conduct  would  really  have  justified  homicide — I  found 
a  treasure  at  Nasik,  in  the  person  of  Silas  Cornelius,  a 
native  Christian,  but  a  Maratha  from  the  Nizam's 
dominions,  who  had  been  brought  up  in  the  schools  of 
the  Church  Mission  near  Nasik.  In  steadiness,  in 
honesty,  in  truthfulness,  in  faithful  service,  in  devotion 
to  the  interests  of  his  employer,  and  in  amiability  of 
disposition,  I  never  knew  of  any  servant  who  surpassed 
or  almost  equalled  Silas  Cornelius  ;  and  his  good  con- 
duct on  my  mountain  journey  was  the  more  remark- 
able, as  he  had  been  led  into  it  step  by  step,  as  I  myself 
had  been,  and  would  never  have  left  Bombay  on  any 
such  undertaking.  "  Very  hard  journey  this,  sir!  very 
hard  journey  !"  was  his  only  remonstrance  in  even  the 
worst  circumstances ;  and  it  was  accompanied  by  a 
screwing  of   the  mouth,  which  was  half   pathetic,  half 


76  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO IV. 

comical.     Not  that  Silas  was  without  his  foibles.    When 
he  found   himself  in  the  mountains  with  a  gun  slung 
behind  his  back,  and  was  made  the  shikar  of  the  expe- 
dition,  as   well   as   my   butler,   this    mild    and   amiable 
individual  assumed  a  most  warlike  appearance  and  air; 
he  tied  up  his  moustache  in  Maratha  fashion,  and  made 
the  other  servants  call  him  Jemadar.     He  also  became 
fond  of  too  promptly  ordering  the  coolies  about,  but  as 
the  hillmen  paid  very  little  attention  to  this,  it  did  not 
much  matter.     The  value  of  this  butler  was  equalled 
by  that  of  a  very  bright,  intelligent  little   Kunait  boy 
about    fifteen,  called    Nurdass,  whom   I   picked   up  at 
Shaso,  close   to   the   Chinese  frontier,  and  who,   as    he 
spoke  Tibetan   and   Hindusthani,  as  well  as  his  native 
Kunawari,  served  me  as  interpreter  on  great  part  of  my' 
journey,   besides    being   useful    in   a   hundred   different 
ways.     These  were  the  two  gems  of  my  small  entourage. 
A  Kunawar  Munshi  called  Phooleyram,  who  went  with 
me  from  Kotgarh  as  far  as  Kashmir,  was  chiefly  of  use  in 
getting  my  tent  and  bed  put  up.    The  only  other  regular 
attendant   I    had   was    an    Afghan    cook    called    Chota 
Khan,  or  the  "  Little  Chief," — a  man  of  great  size  and 
weight,   of   rather    bullying    propensities,   though    very 
useful  on  a  journey,  who  kept  everybody  except  myself 
in  awe,  and  who  was  afraid  of  nothing  except  of  cross- 
ing aj/ifi/a  or  twig  bridge.     Whenever  a  young  lamb  or 
ancient   ram   was   brought  to   us   for  sale,  the   way   in 
which    Chota    Khan    bellowed    out  thunders  of  abuse 
(chiefly  with  an  eye  to  the  satisfaction  of  his  own  capa- 
cious   stomach)     was    exceedingly    useful,    and    really 
frightened  the  astonished    lambadars.     It   was  a  great 
pleasure  to  everybody  when  we  came  to  a  jhiila,  be- 
cause then  the  giant  died,  the  hero  broke  down  utterly, 
and  had  to  be  silent  for  the  rest  of  the  day, — until  in 
the  evening,  among  his  pots  and  pans,  and  after  cutting 


SIMLA  AND  ITS  CELEBRITIES.  77 

the  throat  of  a  sheep  in  orthodox  Mohammedan  fashion, 
with  an  exclamation  which  sounded  much  more  like  a 
curse  than  a  blessing,  he  became  himself  again.  All 
the  other  people  I  required,  whether  coolies,  guides,  01 
yakmen,  were  had  from  village  to  village.  At  Simla  I 
engaged  eight  jhampan-wallahs  to  carry  me  in  a  dandy; 
but  after  five  days  this  agreement  was  ended  by  mutual 
consent,  and  I  depended  entirely  on  people  taken  from 
stage  to  stage,  and  on  ghunts  and  yaks. 

Thus  it  may  be  understood  with  what  appliances  of 
travel  I  started  from  Simla  in  the  commencement  of 
June  ;  but  it  was  not  until  after  the  experience  of  a  few 
days'  journey,  and  I  got  to  Kotgarh,  that  I  managed  to 
bring  things  into  order,  and  was  able  to  cut  down  the 
twenty-eight  coolies  with  which  I  s*tarted  to  about 
twelve  (or  double  that  number  of  boys  and  women  at 
half-pay),  exclusive  of  those  I  might  or  might  not  need 
for  my  own  carriage. 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE    VALLEY  OF   THE   SHADOW   OF  DEATH. 

TlIE  cut  bridle-path,  which  has  been  dignified  by  the 
name  of  "The  Great  Hindusthan  and  Tibet  Road,"  that 
leads  along  the  sides  of  the  hills  from  Simla  to  the  Nar- 
kunda  Ghaut,  and  from  Narkunda  up  the  valley  of  the 
Sutlej  to  Chini  and  Pangay,  is  by  no  means  so  exas- 
perating as  the  native  paths  of  the  inner  Himaliya.  It 
does  not  require*  one  to  dismount  every  five  minutes; 
and  though  it  does  go  down  into  some  terrific  gorges, 
at  the  bottom  of  which  there  is  quite  a  tropical  climate 
in  summer,  yet,  on  the  whole,  it  is  pretty  level,  and 
never  compels  one  (as  the  other  roads  too  often  and  too 
sadly  do)  to  go  up  a  mile  of  perpendicular  height  in  the 
morning,  only  to  go  down  a  mile  of  perpendicular  depth 
in  the  afternoon.  Its  wooden  bridges  can  be  traversed 
on  horseback  ;  it  is  not  much  exposed  to  falling  rocks  ; 
it  is  free  from  avalanches,  either  of  snow  or  granite  ;  and 
it  never  compels  one  to  endure  the  almost  infuriating 
misery  of  having,  every  now  and  then,  to  cross  miles  of 
rugged  blocks  of  stone,  across  which  no  ragged  rascal 
that  ever  lived  could  possibly  run.  Nevertheless,  the 
cut  road,  running  as  it  often  does  without  any  parapet, 
or  with  none  to  speak  of,  and  only  seven  or  eight  feet 
broad,  across  the  face  of  enormous  precipices  and  nearly 
precipitous  slopes,  is  even  more  dangerous  for  eques- 
trians than  are  the  rude  native  paths.  Almost  every 
year  some  fatal  accident  happens  upon  it,  and  the 
wonder  only  is,  that  people  who    set  any  value  upon 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH  79 

their  lives  are  so  foolhardy  as  to  ride  upon  it  at  all.  A 
gentleman  of  the  Forest  Department,  resident  at  Nac- 
har,  remarked  to  me  that  it  was  strange  that,  though 
he  had  been  a  cavalry  officer,  he  never  mounted  a  horse 
in  the  course  of  his  mountain  journeys ;  but  it  struck 
me,  though  he  might  not  have  reasoned  out  the  matter, 
it  was  just  because  he  had  been  a  cavalry  officer,  and 
knew  the  nature  of  horses,  that  he  never  rode  on  such 
paths  as  he  had  to  traverse  in  .Kunavvar.  No  animal  is 
so  easily  startled  as  a  horse,  or  so  readily  becomes 
restive  :  it  will  shy  at  an  oyster-shell,  though  doing  so 
may  dash  it  to  pieces  over  a  precipice  ;  and  one  can 
easily  guess  what  danger  its  rider  incurs  on  a  narrow 
parapetless  road  above  a  precipice  where  there  are 
monkeys  and  falling  rocks  to  startle  it,  and  where  there 
are  obstinate  hillmen  who  will  salaam  the  rider,  say 
what  he  may,  and  who  take  the  inner  side  of  the  road, 
in  order  to  prop  their  burdens  against  the  rock,  and  to 
have  a  good  look  at  him  as  he  passes.  One  of  the 
saddest  of  the  accidents  which  have  thus  happened  was 
that  which  befell  a  very  young  lady,  a  daughter  of  the 
Rev.  Mr  Rebsch,  the  missionary  at  Kotgarh.  She  was 
riding  across  the  tremendous  Rogi  cliffs,  and,  though  a 
wooden  railing  has  since  been  put  up  at  the  place,  there 
was  nothing  between  her  and  the  precipice,  when  her 
pony  shied  and  carried  her  over  to  instant  death.  In 
another  case,  the  victim,  a  Mr  Leith,  was  on  his  marriage 
trip,  and  his  newly-married  wife  was  close  beside  him, 
and  had  just  exchanged  horses  with  him,  when,  in  trying 
to  cure  his  steed  of  a  habit  it  had  of  rubbi'iisT  against  the 
rock  wall,  it  backed  towards  the  precipice,  and  its  hind 
feet  getting  over,  both  horse  and  rider  were  dashed  to 
pieces.  This  happened  between  Serahan  and  Taranda, 
near  the  spot  where  the  road  gave  way  under  Sir  Alex- 
ander Lawrence,  a  nephew  of  Lord  Lawrence,  the  then 


8o  •  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Governor-General.  Sir  Alexander  was  riding  a  heavy 
Australian  horse,  and  the  part  of  the  road  which  gave 
way  was  wooden  planking,  supported  out  from  the  face 
of  the  precipice  by  iron  stanchions.  I  made  my  coolies 
throw  over  a  large  log  of  wood  where  he  went  down  ,• 
and,  as  it  struck  the  rocks  in  its  fall,  it  sent  out  showers 
of  white  splinters,  so  that  the  solid  wood  was  reduced  to 
half  its  original  size  before  it  reached  a  resting-place. 
In  the  case  of  the  wife  of  General  Brind,  that  lady  was 
quietly  making  a  sketch  on  horseback,  from  the  road 
between  Theog  and  Muttiana,  and  her  syce  was  holding 
the  horse,  when  it  was  startled  by  some  falling  stones, 
and  all  three  went  over  and  were  destroyed.  Not  very 
long  after  I  went  up  this  lethal  road,  a  Calcutta  judge, 
of  one  of  the  subordinate  courts,  went  over  it  and  was 
killed  in  the  presence  of  some  ladies  with  whom  he  was 
riding,  owing  simply  to  his  horse  becoming  restive.  An 
eyewitness  of  another  of  these  frightful  accidents  told 
me  that  when  the  horse's  hind  foot  got  off  the  road,  it 
struggled  for  about  half  a  minute  in  that  position,  and 
the  rider  had  plenty  of  time  to  dismount  safely,  and 
might  easily  have  done  so,  but  a  species  of  paralysis 
seemed  to  come  over  him  ;  his  face  turned  deadly  white, 
and  he  sat  on  the  horse  without  making  the  least  effort 
to  save  himself,  until  they  both  went  over  backwards. 
The  sufferer  is  usually  a  little  too  late  in  attempting  to 
dismount.  Theoretically,  it  may  seem  easy  enough  to 
disengage  one's  self  from  a  horse  when  it  is  struggling 
on  the  brink  of  a  precipice  ;  but  let  my  reader  try  the 
experiment,  and  he  will  see  the  mistake.  The  worst 
danger  on  these  cut  roads  is  that  of  the  horse  backing 
towards  the  precipice;  and  when  danger  presents  itself, 
there  is  a  curious  tendency  on  the  part  of  the  rider  to 
pull  his  horse's  head  away  from  the  precipice  towards 
the  rock  wall,  which  is  about  the  worst  thing  he  can  do. 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  Si 

The  few  seconds  (of  which  I  had  some  experience  further 
on)  in  which  you  find  yourself  fairly  going,  are  particu- 
larly interesting,  and  send  an  electric  thrill  through  the 
entire  system. 

I  rode  almost  every  mile  of  the  way,  on  which  it 
was  at  all  possible  to  ride,  from  Chinese  Tartary  to  the 
Kyber  Pass,  on  anything  which  turned  up — yaks,  zo-pos, 
cows,  Spiti  ponies,  a  Khiva  horse,  and  blood-horses. 
On  getting  to  Kashmir  I  purchased  a  horse,  but  did  not 
do  so  before,  as  it  is  impossible  to  take  any  such  animal 
over  rope  and  twig  bridges,  and  the  rivers  are  too  rapid 
and  furious  to  allow  of  a  horse  being  swum  across  these 
latter  obstacles.  The  traveller  in  the  Himaliya,  how- 
ever, ought  always  to  take  a  saddle  with  him  ;  for  the 
native  saddles,  though  well  adapted  for  riding  down 
nearly  perpendicular  slopes,  are  extremely  uncomfort- 
able, and  the  safety  which  they  might  afford  is  consider- 
ably decreased  by  the  fact  that  their  straps  are  often  in 
a  rotten  condition,  and  exceedingly  apt  to  give  way  just 
at  the  critical  moment.  An  English  saddle  will  do  per- 
fectly well  if  it  has  a  crupper  to  it,  but  that  is  absolutely 
necessary.  Some  places  are" so  steep  that,  when  riding 
down  them,  I  was  obliged  to  have  a  rope  put  round  my 
chest  and  held  by  two  men  above,  in  order  to  prevent 
me  going  over  the  pony's  head,  or  throwing  it  off  its 
balance.  But  on  the  Hindusthan  and  Tibet  road  I  had 
to  be  carried  in  a  dandy,  which  is  the  only  kind  of  con- 
veyance that  can  be  taken  over  the  Himaliya.  The 
dandy  is  unknown  in  Europe,  and  is  not  very  easily 
described,  as  there  is  no  other  means  of  conveyance 
which  can  afford  the  faintest  idea  of  it.  The  nearest 
approach  to  travelling  in  a  dandy  I  can  think  of,  is 
sitting  in  a  half-reefed  topsail  in  a  storm,  with  the  head 
and  shoulders  above  the  yard.  It  consists  of  a  single 
bamboo,  about  9  or    10  feet   long,  with  two  pieces  of 


82  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

carpet  slung  from  it — one  for  the  support  of  the  body, 
and  the  other  for  the  feet.  You  rest  on  these  pieces  of 
carpet,  not  in  line  with  the  bamboo,  but  at  right  angles 
to  it,  with  your  head  and  shoulders  raised  as  high  above 
it  as  possible  ;  and  each  end  of  the  pole  rests  on  the 
shoulders  of  one  or  of  two  bearers.  The  dandy  is  quite 
a  pleasant  conveyance  when  one  gets  used  to  it,  when 
the  path  is  tolerably  level  and  the  bearers  are  up  to 
their  work.  The  only  drawbacks  then  are  that,  when  a 
rock  comes  bowling  across  the  road  like  a  cannon-shot, 
you  cannot  disengage  yourself  from  the  carpets  in  time 
to  do  anything  yourself  towards  getting  out  of  the  way  ; 
and  that,  when  the  road  is  narrow,  and,  in  consequence, 
your  feet  are  dangling  over  a  precipice,  it  is  difficult  for 
a  candid  mind  to  avoid  concluding  that  the  bearers 
would  be  quite  justified  in  throwing  the  whole  concern 
over,  and  so  getting  rid  of  their  unwelcome  and  painful 
task.  But  when  the  path  is  covered  with  pieces  of  rock, 
as  usually  happens  to  be  the  case,  and  the  coolies  are 
not  well  up  to  their  work,  which  they  almost  never  are, 
the  man  in  the  dandy  is  not  allowed  much  leisure  for 
meditations  of  any  kind,  or  even  for  admiring  the  scenery 
around ;  for,  unless  he  confines  his  attention  pretty 
closely  to  the  rocks  with  which  he  is  liable  to  come  into 
collision,  he  will  soon  have  all  the  breath  knocked  out 
of  his  body.  On  consulting  a  Continental  savan,  who 
had  been  in  the  inner  Himaliya,  as  to  whether  I  could 
get  people  there  to  carry  me  in  a  dandy,  he  said,  "Zey 
vill  carry  you,  no  doubt ;  but  zey  vill  bomp  you."  And 
bump  me  they  did,  until  they  bumped  me  out  of  adher- 
ence to  that  mode  of  travel.  Indeed  they  hated  and 
feared  having  to  carry  me  so  much,  that  I  often  won- 
dered at  their  never  adopting  the  precipice  alternative. 
But  in  the  Himaliyan  states  the  villagers  have  to  furnish 
the  traveller,,  and  especially  the  English  traveller,  with 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH. 


83 


the  carriage  which  he  requires,  and  at  a  certain  fixed 
rate.  This  is  what  is  called  the  right  of  bigar,  and 
without  the  exercise  of  it,  travelling  would  be  almost 
impossible  among  the  mountains.  I  also  had  a  special 
purwawiah,  which  would  have  entitled  me,  in  case  of 
necessity,  to  seize  what  I  required  ;  but  this  I  kept  in 
the  background. 

The  stages  from   Simla   to   Pangay,    along   the    cut 
bridle-path,  are  as  follows,  according  to  miles : — 


Fagii, 

10 

miles. 

Taranda, 

. 

15  miles. 

Theog, 

6 

n 

Poynda, 

. 

5     „ 

Muttiana,    . 

11 

11 

Nachar, 

. 

7     „ 

Narkunda,  . 

12 

11 

Wangui, 

. 

10     „ 

Kotgarh, 

10 

i> 

Oorni, 

»        . 

5     „ 

Nirth, 

>         12 

» 

Rogi, 

• 

1°     i> 

Rampur, 

12 

» 

Chini,          , 

• 

3     » 

Gaura,         .         , 

9 

H 

Pangay,       , 

• 

7     ,» 

Serahan,      . 

13 

» 

This  road,  however,  has  four  great  divisions,  each  with 
marked  characteristics  of  its  own.  To  Narkunda  it 
winds  along  the  sides  of  not  very  interesting  mountains, 
and  about  the  same  level  as  Simla,  till  at  the  Narkunda 
Ghaut  it  rises  nearly  to  9000  feet,  and  affords  a  gloomy 
view  into  the  Sutlej  valley,  and  a  splendid  view  of  the 
snowy  ranges  beyond.  In  the  second  division  it  de- 
scends into  the  burning  Sutlej  valley,  and  follows  near 
to  the  course  of  that  river,  on  the  left  bank,  until,  after 
passing  Rampur,  the  capital  of  the  state  of  Bussahir,  it 
rises  on  the  mountain  bides  again  up  to  Gaura.  Thirdly, 
it  continues  along  the  mountain-sides,  for  the  most  part 
between  6000  and  7COO  feet  high,  and  through  the  most 
magnificent  forests  of  deodar,  till  it  descends  again  to- 
the  Sutlej,  crosses  that  river  at  Wangtu  Bridge,  and 
ascends  to  Oorni.  Lastly,  it  runs  from  Oorni  to  Pan- 
gay, at  a  height  of  nearly  9000  feet,  on  the  right  bank 


84  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

of  the  Sutlej,  and  sheltered  from  the  Indian  monsoon 
by  the  20,000  feet  high  snowy  peaks  of  the  Kailas, 
which  rise  abruptly  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  river. 

The  view  of  the  mountains  from  Narkunda  is  wonder- 
ful indeed,  and  well  there  might  the  spirit 

"  Take  flight ; — inherit 

Alps  or  Andes — they  are  thine  1 
With  the  morning's  roseate  spirit 

Sweep  the  length  of  snowy  line." 

But  the  view  down  into  the  valley  of  the  Sutlej  is  ex- 
ceedingly gloomy  and  oppressive  ;  and  on  seeing  it,  I 
could  not  help  thinking  of  the  "  Valley  of  the  Shadow 
of  Death."  The  same  idea  had  struck  Lieut.-Colonel 
Moore,  the  interpreter  to  the  Commander-in-chief,  whom 
I  met  at  Kotgarh,  a  little  lower  down,  along  with  Cap- 
tain De  Roebeck,  one  of  the  Governor-General's  aides- 
de-camp.  No  description  could  give  an  adequate  idea 
of  the  tattered,  dilapidated,  sunburnt,  and  woe-begone 
appearance  of  these  two  officers  as  they  rode  up  to 
Kotgarh  after  their  experience  of  the  snows  of  Spiti. 
Colonel  Moore's  appearance,  especially,  would  have 
made  his  fortune  on  the  stage.  There  was  nothing 
woful,  however,  in  his  spirit,  and  he  kept  me  up  half 
the  night  laughing  at  his  most  humorous  accounts  of 
Spiti,  its  animals  and  its  ponies  ;  but  even  this  genial 
officer's  sense  of  enjoyment  seemed  to  desert  him  when 
lie  spoke  of  his  experience  of  the  hot  Sutlej  valley  from 
Gaura  to  Kotgarh,  and' he  said  emphatically,  "  It  is 
the  Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Death."  I  was  struck  by 
this  coincidence  with  my  own  idea,  because  it  was 
essential  for  me  to  get  up  into  high  regions  of  pure  air, 
and  I  could  not  but  dread  the  journey  up  the  Sutlej 
valley,  with  its  vegetation,  its  confined  atmosphere,  its 
rock-heat,  and  its  gloomy  gorges.      I  had  a  sort  of  pre- 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  85 

cognition  that  some  special  danger  was  before  me,  and 
was  even  alarmed  by  an  old  man,  whose  parting  bene- 
diction to  us  was,  "  Take  care  of  the  bridges  beyond 
Nachar."  This  was  something  like,  "  Beware  the  pine- 
tree's  withered  branch,"  and  I  began  to  have  gloomy 
doubts  about  my  capacity  for  getting  high  enough.  Mr 
Rebsch,  the  amiable  and  talented  head  of  the  Kotgarh 
Mission  (of  which  establishment  I  hope  elsewhere  to 
give  a  fuller  notice  than  could  be  introduced  here),  gave 
me  all  the  encouragement  which  could  be  derived  from 
his  earnest  prayers  for  my  safety  among  the  hohe 
Gebirge.  There  were  two  clever  German  young  ladies, 
too,  visiting  at  Kotgarh,  who  seemed  to  think  it  was 
quite  unnecessary  for  me  to  go  up  into  the  high  moun- 
tains ;  so  that,  altogether,  I  began  to  wish  that  I  was 
out  of  the  valley  before  I  had  got  well  into  it,  and  to 
feel  something  like  a  fated  pilgrim  who  was  going  to 
some  unknown  doom. 

Excelsior,  however,  was  my  unalterable  motto,  as  I 
immediately  endeavoured  to  prove  by  descending  some 
thousand  feet  into  the  hot  Sutlej  valley,  in  spite  of  all 
the  attractions  of  Kotgarh.  I  shall  say  very  little  about 
the  journey  up  to  Chini,  as  it  is  so  often  undertaken,  but 
may  mention  two  incidents  which  occurred  upon  it. 
Between  Nirth  and  Rampur  the  heat  was  so  intense, 
close,  and  suffocating,  that  I  travelled  by  night,  with 
torches  ;  and  stopping  to  rest  a  little,  about  midnight, 
I  was  accosted  by  a  native  gentleman,  who  came  out  of 
the  darkness,  seated  himself  behind  me,  and  said  in 
English,  "Who  are  you  ?"  I  had  a  suspicion  who  my 
friend  was,  but  put  a  similar  question  to  him  ;  on  which 
he  replied,  not  without  a  certain  dignity,  "  I  am  the 
Rajah  of  Bussahir."  This  Bussahir,  which  includes 
Kunawar,  and  extends  up  the  Sutlej  valley  to  Chinese 
Tibet,  is  the  state  in  which  I  was  travelling.     Its  pro- 


86  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO  W. 

ducts  are  opium,  grain,  and  woollen  manufactures,  and  it 
has  a  population  of  90,000  and  nominal  revenue  of 
50,000  rupees ;  but  the  sums  drawn  from  it  in  one  way 
or  another,  by  Government  officers,  must  considerably 
exceed  that  amount.  Its  rajah  was  exceedingly  affable; 
and  his  convivial  habits  are  so  well  known,  and  have 
been  so  often  alluded  to,  that  I  hope  there  is  no  harm 
in  saying  that  on  this  occasion  he  was  not  untrue  to  his 
character.  I  found  him,  however,  to  be  a  very  agree- 
able man,  and  he  is  extremely  well-meaning — so  much 
so,  as  to  be  desirous  of  laying  down  his  sovereignty  if 
only  the  British  Government  would  be  good  enough  to 
accept  it  from  him,  and  give  him  a  pension  instead. 
But  there  are  much  worse  governed  states  than  Bussa- 
hir,  notwithstanding  the  effects  on  its  amiable  and  in- 
telligent rajah  of  a  partial  and  ill-adjusted  English 
education,  in  which  undue  importance  was  assigned  to 
the  use  of  brandy.  He  caused  some  alarm  among  my 
people  by  insisting  on  handling  my  revolver,  which  was 
loaded  ;  but  he  soon  showed  that  he  knew  how  to  use 
it  with  extraordinary  skill ;  for,  on  a  lighted  candle  being 
put  up  for  him  to  fire  at,  about  thirty  paces  off,  though  he 
could  scarcely  stand  by  this  time,  yet  he  managed, 
somehow  or  other,  to  prop  himself  up  against  a  tree, 
and  snuffed  out  the  candle  at  the  first  shot.  On  the 
whole,  the  rajah  made  a  very  favourable  impression  upon 
me,  despite  his  peculiarity,  if  such  it  may  be  called  ;  and 
my  nocturnal  interview  with  him,  under  huge  trees,  in 
the  middle  of  a  dark  wet  night,  remains  a  very  curious 
and  pleasant  recollection. 

The  other  incident  was  of  a  more  serious  character,  and 
illustrated  a  danger  which  every  year  carries  off  a  certain 
number  of  the  hillmen.  Standing  below  the  bungalow 
at  Serahan,  I  noticed  some  men,  who  were  ascending  to 
their  village,  racing  against  each  other  on   the  grassy 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  87 

brow  cf  a  precipice  that  rose  above  the  road  leading 
to  Gaura.  One  of  them  unfortunately  lost  his  footing, 
slipped  a  little  on  the  edge,  and  then  went  over  the  pre- 
cipice, striking  the  road  below  with  a  tremendous  thud, 
after  an  almost  clear  fall  of  hundreds  of  feet,  and  then 
rebounding  from  off  the  road,  and  falling  about  a  hun- 
dred  feet  into  a  ravine  below.  I  had  to  go  round  a 
ravine  some  way  in  order  to  reach  him,  so  that  when  I 
did  so,  he  was  not  only  dead,  but  nearly  cold.  The 
curious  thing  is,  that  there  was  no  external  bruise  about 
him.  The  mouth  and  nostrils  were  filled  with  clotted 
blood,  but  otherwise  there  was  no  indication  even  of  the 
cause  of  his  death.  The  rapidity  of  his  descent  through 
the  air  must  have  made  him  so  far  insensible  as  to  pre- 
vent that  contraction  of  the  muscles  which  is  the  great 
cause  of  bones  being  broken  ;  and  then  the  tremendous 
concussion  when  he  struck  the  road  must  have  knocked 
every  particle  of  life  out  of  him.  This  man's  brother — 
his  polyandric  brother,  as  it  turned  out,  though  polyan- 
dry only  commences  at  Serahan,  being  a  Lama  and  not 
a  Hindu  institution,  but  the  two  religions  are  mixed  up 
a  little  at  the  points  of  contact — reached  the  body  about 
the  same  time  as  I  did,  and  threw  himself  upon  it,  weep- 
ing and  lamenting.  I  wished  to  try  the  effect  of  some 
very  strong  ammonia,  but  the  brother  objected  to  this, 
because,  while  probably  it  would  have  been  of  no  use, 
it  would  have  defiled  the  dead,  according  to  his  religious 
ideas.  The  only  other  sympathy  I  could  display  was 
the  rather  coarse  one  of  paying  the  people  of  Serahan, 
who  showed  no  indications  of  giving  assistance,  for 
carrying  the  corpse  up  to  its  village  ;  but  the  brother, 
who  understood  Hindusthani,  preferred  to  take  the 
money  himself,  in  order  to  purchase  wood  for  the  funeral 
pyre.  Me  was  a  large  strong  man,  whereas  the  deceased 
was  little  and  slight,  so  he  wrapped  the  dead  body  in 


88  THE  ABODE  OF  SA'O  IV. 

his  plaid,  and  slung  it  over  his  shoulders.  There  was 
something  almost  comic,  as  well  as  exceedingly  pathetic, 
in  the  way  in  which  he  toiled  up  the  mountain  with  his 
sad  burden,  wailing  and  weeping  over  it  whenever  he 
stopped  to  rest,  and  kissing  the  cold  face. 

The  road  up  to  Chini  is  almost  trodden  ground,  and 
so  does  not  call  for  special  description ;  but  it  is  pictur- 
esque in  the  highest  degree,  and  presents  wonderful 
combinations  of  beauty  and  grandeur.  It  certainly  has 
sublime  heights  above,  and  not  less  extraordinary 
depths  below.  Now  we  catch  a  glimpse  of  a  snowy 
peak  20,000  feet  high  rising  close  above  us,  and  the 
next  minute  we  look  down  into  a  dark  precipitous  gorge 
thousands  of  feet  deep.  Then  we  have,  below  the 
snowy  peaks,  Himaliyan  hamlets,  with  their  fiat  roofs, 
placed  on  ridges  of  rock  or  on  green  sloping  meadows ; 
enormous  deodars,  clothed  with  veils  of  white  flowering 
clematis ;  grey  streaks  of  water  below,  from  whence 
comes  the  thundering  sound  of  the  imprisoned  Sutlej — 
the  classic  Hesudrus ;  almost  precipitous  slopes  of 
shingle,  and  ridges  of  mountain  fragments.  Above, 
there  are  green  alps,  with  splendid  trees  traced  out 
against  the  sky  ;  the  intense  blue  of  the  sky,  and  the 
dark  overshadowing  precipices.  Anon,  the  path  de- 
scends into  almost  tropical  shade  at  the  bottom  of  the 
great  ravines,  with  ice-cold  water  falling  round  the  dark 
roots  of  the  vegetation,  and  an  almost  ice-cold  air  fan- 
ning the  great  leafy  branches.  The  trees  which  meet 
us  almost  at  every  step  in  this  upper  Sutlej  valley  are 
worthy  of  the  sublime  scenery  by  which  they  are  sur- 
rounded, and  are  well  fitted  to  remind  us,  ere  we  pass 
into  the  snowy  regions  of  unsullied  truth  untouched  by 
organic  life,  that  the  struggling  and  half-developed 
vegetable  world  aspires  towards  heaven,  and  has  not 
been  unworthy  of  the  grand  design.     Even  beneath  the 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  89 

deep  blue  dome,  the  cloven  precipices  and  the  sky- 
pointing  snowy  peaks,  the  gigantic  deodars  (which 
cluster  most  richly  about  Nachar)  may  well  strike  with 
awe  by  their  wonderful  union  of  grandeur  and  perfect 
beauty.  In  the  dog  and  the  elephant  we  often  see  a 
devotion- so  touching,  and  the  stirring  of  an  intellect  so 
great  and  earnest  as  compared  with  its  cruel  narrow 
bounds,  that  we  are  drawn  towards  them  as  to  some- 
thing almost  surpassing  human  nature  in  its  confiding 
simplicity  and  faithful  tenderness.  No  active  feeling  of 
this  kind  can  be  called  forth  by  the  innumerable  forms 
of  beauty  which  rise  around  us  from  the  vegetable  world. 
They  adorn  our  gardens  and  clothe  our  hillsides,  giving 
joy  to  the  simplest  maiden,  yet  directing  the  winds  and 
rains,  and  purifying  the  great  expanses  of  air.  So  far 
as  humanity,  so  dependent  upon  them,  is  concerned, 
they  are  silent ;  no  means  of  communication  exist  be- 
tween us ;  and  silently,  unremonstrantly,  they  answer 
to  our  care  or  indifference  for  them,  by  reproducing,  in 
apparently  careless  abundance,  their  more  beautiful  or 
noxious  forms.  But  we  cannot  say  that  they  are  not 
sentient,  or  even  conscious  beings.  The  expanding  of 
flowers  to  the  light,  and  the  contraction  of  some  to  the 
touch,  indicate  a  highly  sentient  nature ;  and  in  the 
slow,  cruel  action  of  carnivorous  plants,  there  is  some- 
thing approaching  to  the  fierce  instincts  of  the  brute 
world.  Wordsworth,  than  whom  no  poet  more  pro- 
foundly understood  the  life  of  nature,  touched  on  this 
subject  when  he  said — 

"  Through  primrose  turfs,  in  that  sweet  bower, 
The  periwinkle  trailed  its  wreaths; 
And  'tis  my  faith  that  every  flower 
Enjoys  the  air  it  breathes. 


90  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

"The  budding  twigs  spread  out  their  fan 
To  catcli  the  breezy  air; 
And  I  must  think,  do  all  I  can, 
That  there  was  pleasure  there." 

If  anything  of  this  kind  exists,  how  great  and  grave 
must  be  the  sentient  feeling  of  the  mighty  pines  and 
cedars  of  the  Himaliya  !  There  is  a  considerable 
variety  of  them, — as  the  Pinas  excelsa,  or  the  "  weeping 
fir,"  which,  though  beautiful,  is  hardly  deserving  of  its 
aspiring  name  ;  the  Pinus  longifolia,  or  Cheel  tree,  the 
most  abundant  of  all ;  the  Finns  Khutrow,  or  Picea 
Morinda,  which  almost  rivals  the  deodars  in  height ; 
and  the  Pinus  Morinda,  or  Abies  Pindrow,  the  "  silver 
fir,"  which  attains  the  greatest  height  of  all.  But,  ex- 
celling all  these,  is  the  Cedrus  deodara,  the  Deodar  or 
Kedron  tree.  There  was  something  very  grand  about 
these  cedars  of  the  Sutlej  valley,  sometimes  forty  feet  in 
circumference,  and  rising  almost  to  two  hundred  feet,  or 
half  the  height  of  St  Paul's,  on  nearly  precipitous  slopes, 
and  on  the  scantiest  soil,  yet  losing  no  line  of  beauty  in 
their  stems  and  their  graceful  pendant  branches,  and 
with  their  tapering  stems  and  green  arrowy  spikes 
covered  by  a  clinging  trellis-work  of  Virginia  creepers 
and  clematis  still  in  white  bloom.  These  silent  giants 
of  a  world  which  is  not  our  own,  but  which  we  carelessly 
use  as  our  urgent  wants  demand,  had  owed  nothing  to 
the  cultivating  care  of  man.  Fed  by  the  snow-rills,  and 
by  the  dead  lichens  and  strong  grass  which  once  found 
life  on  the  debris  of  gneiss  and  mica-slate,  undisturbed 
by  the  grubbing  of  wild  animals,  and  as  undesirable  in 
their  tough  green  wood  when  young  as  unavailable  in 
their  fuller  growth  for  the  use  of  the  puny  race  of  man- 
kind which  grew  up  around  them,  they  were  free,  for 
countless  centuries,  to  seek  air  and  light  and  moisture, 
and  to  attain  the  perfect  stature  which  they  now  pre- 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  91 


sent,  but  which  is  unlikely  to  be  continued  now  that 
they  are  exposed  to  the  axes  of  human  beings  who  can 
turn  them  "to  use."  If,  as  the  Sinhalese  assert,  the 
cocoa-nut  palm  withers  away  when  beyond  the  reach  of 
the  human  voice,  it  is  easy  to  conceive  how  the  majestic 
deodar  must  delight  in  being  beyond  our  babblement. 
Had  Camoens  seen  this  cedar,  he  might  have  said 
of  it,  even  more  appropriately  than  he  has  done  of  the 
cypress,  that  it  may  be  a 

"  Preacher  to  the  wise, 
Lessening  from  earth  her  spiral  honours  rise, 
Till,  as  a  spear-point  reared,  the  topmost  spray 
Points  to  the  Eden  of  eternal  day." 

The  view  from  Chini  and  Pangay  of  the  Raldung 
Kailas,  one  portion  of  the  great  Indian  Kailas,  or 
Abode  of  the  Gods,  is  very  magnificent ;  but  I  shall 
speak  of  that  when  treating  generally  of  the  various 
groups  of  the  higher  Himaliya.  At  Pangay  there  is  a 
large  good  bungalow;  and  the  Hindusthan  and  Tibet 
road  there  comes  to  an  end,  so  far  as  it  is  a  cut  road, 
or,  indeed,  a  path  on  which  labour  of  any  kind  is  ex- 
pended. It  is  entirely  protected  by  the  Kailas  from 
the  Indian  monsoon  ;  and  I  found  a  portion  of  it  occu- 
pied by  Captain  and  Mrs  Henderson,  who  wisely  pre- 
ferred a  stay  there  to  one  in  the  more  exposed  and 
unhealthy  hill-stations,  though  it  was  so  far  from 
society,  and  from  most  of  the  comforts  of  life.  The 
easiest  way  from  Pangay  to  Lippe  is  over  the  Werung 
Pass,  12,400  feet;  but  Captain  Henderson,  on  his  re- 
turning from  a  shooting  excursion,  reported  so  much 
snow  upon  it,  that  I  determined  to  go  up  the  valley  of 
the  Sutlej,  winding  along  the  sides  of  the  steep  but  still 
pine-covered  mountains  on  its  right  bank.  So,  on  the 
28th  June,  after  a  delay  of  a  few  days  in  order  to  re- 


92  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

cruit  and  prepare,  I  bade  adieu  to  civilisation,  as  repre- 
sented in  the  persons  of  the  kind  occupants  of  the  bun- 
galow at  Pangay,  and  fairly  started  for  tent-life.  A 
very  short  experience  of  the  "  road "  was  sufficient  to 
stagger  one,  and  to  make  me  cease  to  wonder  at  the 
retreat  of  two  young  cavalry  officers  I  met,  a  few  days 
before,  on  their  way  back  to  Simla,  and  who  had 
started  from  Pangay  with  some  intention  of  going  to 
Shipki,  but  gave  up  the  attempt  after  two  miles'  ex- 
perience of  the  hard  road  they  would  have  to  travel. 
The  great  Hindusthan  and  Tibet  affair  was  bad 
enough,  but  what  was  this  I  had  come  to  ?  For  a  few 
miles  it  had  once  been  a  cut  road,  but  years  and  grief 
had  made  it  worse  than  the  ordinary  native  paths.  At 
some  places  it  was  impassable  even  for  hill-ponies,  and 
to  be  carried  in  a  dandy  over  a  considerable  part  of  it 
was  out  of  the  question.  But  the  aggravation  thus 
caused  was  more  than  compensated  for  by  the  magni- 
ficent view  of  snowy  peaks  which  soon  appeared  in 
front,  and  which,  though  they  belonged  to  the  Kailas 
group,  were  more  striking  than  the  Kailas  as  it  appears 
from  Chini  or  Pangay.  Those  enormous  masses  of 
snow  and  ice  rose  into  the  clouds  above  us  to  such  a 
height,  and  apparently  so  near,  that  it  seemed  as  if 
their  fall  would  overwhelm  the  whole  Sutlej  valley  in 
our  neighbourhood,  and  they  suggested  that  I  was 
entering  into  the  wildest  and  sublimest  region  of  the 
earth.  These  peaks  had  the  appearance  of  being  on 
our  side  of  the  Sutlej,  but  they  lie  between  that  river 
and  Chinese  Tartary,  in  the  bend  which  it  makes  when 
it  turns  north  at  Buspa  ;  they  are  in  the  almost  habita- 
tionless  district  of  Morang,  and  are  all  over  20,coo  feet 
high.  My  coolies  called  them  the  Shurang  peaks;  and 
it  is  well  worth  while  for  all  visitors  to  Pangay  to  go  up 
a  few  miles  from  that  place  in  order  to  get  a  glimpse 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  93 

of  the  terrific  Alpine  sublimity  which  is  thus  disclosed, 
and  which  has  all  the  more  effect  as  it  is  seen  ere  vege- 
tation ceases,  and  through  the  branches  of  splendid  and 
beautiful  trees. 

At  Rarang,  which  made  a  half  day's  journey,  the 
extreme  violence  of  the  Himaliyan  wind,  which  blows 
usually  throughout  the  day,  but  most  fortunately  dies 
away  at  night,  led  me  to  camp  in  a  sheltered  and 
beautiful  spot,  on  a  terraced  field,  under  walnut  and 
apricot  trees,  and  with  the  Kailas  rising  before  my  tent 
on  the  other  side  of  the  Sutlej.  Every  now  and  then 
in  the  afternoon,  and  when  the  morning  sun  began  to 
warm  its  snows,  avalanches  shot  down  the  scarred  sides 
of  the  Kailas  ;  and  when  their  roar  ceased,  and  the  wind 
died  away  a  little,  I  could  hear  the  soft  sound  of  the 
waving  cascades  of  white  foam — some  of  which  must 
have  rivalled  the  Staubbach  in  height — that  diversified 
its  lower  surface,  but  which  became  silent  and  unseen 
as  the  cold  of  evening  locked  up  their  sources  in  the 
glaciers  and  snow  above.  Where  we  were,  at  the  height 
of  about  9000  feet,  the  thermometer  was  as  high  as  700 
Fahrenheit  at  sunset ;  but  at  sunrise  it  was  at  57°  and 
everything  was  frozen  up  on  the  grand  mountains  op- 
posite. Though  deodars  and  edible  pines  were  still 
found  on  the  way  to  Jangi,  that  road  was  even  worse 
than  its  predecessor,  and  Silas  and  Chota  Khan  several 
times  looked  at  me  with  hopeless  despair.  In  parti- 
cular, I  made  my  first  experience  here  of  what  a  granite 
avalanche  means,  but  should  require  the  pen  of  Bunyan 
in  order  to  do  justice  to  its  discouraging  effects  upon 
the  pilgrim.  When  Alexander  Gerard  passed  along 
this  road  fifty-six  years  before,  he  found  it  covered  by 
the  remains  of  a  granite  avalanche.  Whether  the  same 
avalanche  has  remained  there  ever  since,  or,  as  my 
coolies  averred,  granite  avalanches  are  in  the  habit  of 


94  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

coming  down  on  that  particular  piece  of  road,  I  cannot 
say  ;  but  either  explanation  is  quite  sufficient  to  account 
for  the  result.  The  whole  mountain-side  was  covered 
for  a  long  way  with  huge  blocks  of  gneiss  and  granite, 
over  which  we  had  to  scramble  as  best  we  could,  in- 
spired by  the  conviction  that  where  these  came  from 
there  might  be  more  in  reserve.  At  one  point  we  had 
to  wind  round  the  corner  of  a  precipice  on  two  long 
poles  which  rested  on  a  niche  at  the  corner  of  the  preci- 
pice which  had  to  be  turned,  and  which  there  met  two 
corresponding  poles  from  the  opposite  side.  This  could 
only  have  been  avoided  by  making  a  detour  of  some 
hours  over  the  granite  blocks,  so  we  were  all  glad  to 
risk  it ;  and  the  only  dangerous  part  of  the  operation 
was  getting  round  the  corner  and  passing  from  the  first 
two  poles  to  the  second  two,  which  were  on  a  lower 
level.  As  these  two  movements  had  to  be  performed 
simultaneously,  and  could  only  be  accomplished  by 
hugging  the  rock  as  closely  as  possible,  the  passage 
there  was  really  ticklish  ;  and  even  the  sure-footed  and 
experienced  hillmen  had  to  take  our  baggage  round  it 
in  the  smallest  possible  instalments. 

At  Jangi  there  was  a  beautiful  camping-place,  be- 
tween some  great  rocks  and  under  some  very  fine  wal- 
nut and  gnczv  (edible  pine)  trees.  The  village  close  by, 
though  small,  had  all  the  marks  of  moderate  affluence, 
and  had  a  Hindu  as  well  as  a  Lama  temple,  the  former 
religion  hardly  extending  any  further  into  the  Hima- 
liya,  though  one  or  two  outlying  villages  beyond  belong 
to  it.  Both  at  Pangay  and  Rarang  I  had  found  the 
ordinary  prayer-wheel  used — a  brass  or  bronze  cylinder, 
about  six  inches  long,  and  two  or  three  in  diameter, 
containing  a  long  scroll  of  paper,  on  which  were  written 
innumerable  reduplications  of  the  Lama  prayer — "Om 
ma  ni  pad  ma  houn" — and  which  is  turned  from  left  to 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  95 

right  in  the  monk's  hand  by  means  of  an  axle  which 
passes  through  its  centre.  But  in  the  Lama  temple  at 
Jangi  I  found  a  still  more  powerful  piece  of  devotional 
machinery,  in  the  shape  of  a,  gigantic  prayer-mill  made 
of  bronze,  about  seven  or  eight  feet  in  diameter,  and 
which  might  be  turned  either  by  the  hand  or  by  a  rill 
of  water  which  could  be  made  to  fall  upon  it  when 
water  was  in  abundance.  This  prayer  contained  I  am 
afraid  to  say  how  many  millions  of  repetitions  of  the 
great  Lama  prayer  ;  and  the  pious  Ritualists  of  Jangi 
were  justly  proud  of  it,  and  of  the  eternal  advantages 
which  it  gave  them  over  their  carnal  and  spiritually  in- 
different neighbours.  The  neophyte  who  showed  the 
prayer-mill  to  me  turned  it  with  ease,  and  allowed  me 
to  send  up  a  million  prayers.  In  describing  one  of  the 
Lama  monasteries,  to  be  met  farther  on  in  the  Tibe':an 
country,  I  shall  give  a  fuller  account  of  these  prayer- 
wheels  and  mills.  The  temple  at  Jangi,  with  its 
Tibetan  inscriptions  and  paintings  of  Chinese  devils, 
told  me  that  I  was  leaving  the  region  of  Hinduism. 
At  Lippe,  where  I  stopped  next  day,  all  the  people  ap- 
peared to  be  Tibetan  ;  and  beyond  that  I  found  only 
two  small  isolated  communities  of  Hindu  Kunaits,  the 
one  at  Shaso  and  the  other  at  Namgea.  The  gnew  tree, 
or  edible  pine  {Pinus  Gerardina),  under  some  of  which 
I  camped  at  Jangi,  extends  higher  up  than  does  the 
deodar.  I  saw  some  specimens  of  it  opposite  Pii  at 
about  12,000  feet.  The  edible  portion  is  the  almond- 
shaped  seeds,  which  are  to  be  found  within  the  cells  of 
the  cone,  and  which  contain  a  sweet  whitish  pulp  that  is 
not  unpleasant  to  the  taste.  This  tree  is  similar  to  the 
Italian  Pinus  pinea ;  and  varieties  of  it  are  found  in 
California,  and  in  Japan,  where  it  is  called  the  ginko. 

The  road  to  Lippe,  though  bad  and    fatiguing,  pre- 
sented nothing  of  the  dangers  of  the  preceding  day,  and 


96  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

took  us  away  from  the  Sutlej  valley  up  the  right  bank 
of  the  Pijar,  also  called  Teti,  river.  In  colder  weather, 
when  the  streams  are  either  frozen  or  ver}'  low,  the 
nearest  way  from  Jangi  to  Shipki  is  to  go  all  the  way 
up  the  Sutlej  valley  to  Pu  ;  but  in  summer  that  is  im- 
possible, from  the  size  and  violence  of  the  streams, 
which  are  swollen  by  the  melting  snows.  At  this  large 
village  a  woman  was  brought  to  me  who  had  been  struck 
on  the  head  by  a  falling  rock  about  a  year  before.  It 
was  a  very  extraordinary  case,  and  showed  the  good 
effects  of  mountain  air  and  diet,  because  a  piece  of  the 
skull  had  been  broken  off  altogether  at  the  top  of  her 
head,  leaving  more  than  a  square  inch  of  the  brain 
exposed,  with  only  a  thin  membrane  over  it.  The 
throbbing  of  the  brain  was  distinctly  perceptible  under 
this  membrane ;  and  yet  the  woman  was  in  perfect 
health,  and  seemed  quite  intelligent.  I  once  saw  a 
Chinaman's  skull  in  a  similar  state,  after  he  had  been 
beaten  by  some  Tartar  troops,  but  he  was  quite  uncon- 
scious and  never  recovered  ;  whereas  this  young  woman 
was  not  only  well  but  cheerful,  and  I  recommended  her 
to  go  to  Simla  and  get  a  metallic  plate  put  in,  as  that 
was  the  only  thing  which  could  be  done  for  her,  and  her 
case  might  be  interesting  to  the  surgeons  there. 

But  at  Lippe  it  became  clear  to  me  that,  while  the 
mountain  air  had  its  advantages,  the  mountain  water,  or 
something  of  the  kind,  was  not  always  to  be  relied  upon, 
for  I  found  myself  suffering  from  an  attack  of  acute 
dysentery  of  the  malignant  type.  As  to  the  primary 
origin  of  this  attack  I  was  not  without  grave  suspicions, 
though  far  from  being  sure  on  the  subject.  At  Pangay 
one  day  I  congratulated  myself  on  the  improved  state 
of  my  health  as  I  sat  down  to  lunch,  which  consisted  of 
a  stew  ;  and  half  an  hour  afterwards  I  began  to  suffer 
severely  from  symptoms  corresponding  to  those  caused 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  97 

by  irritant  metallic  poisoning-.  I  spoke  to  my  servants 
about  this,  and  have  not  the  remotest  suspicion  of  Silas; 
but  it  struck  me  that  another  of  them  showed  a  certain 
amount  of  shamefacedness  when  he  suggested  bad  water 
as  the  cause ;  and  though  Captain  and  Mrs  Henderson 
had  been  living-  for  a  month  at  Pangay,  they  had  found 
nothing  to  complain  of  in  the  water.  It  is  very  un- 
pleasant when  suspicions  of  this  kind  arise,  because  it 
is  almost  impossible  to  disprove  them ;  and  yet  one  feels 
that  the  harbouring/  of  them  may  be  doing  cruel  injustice 
to  worthy  men.  But,  some  time  before,  I  had  become 
convinced,  from  a  variety  of  circumstances,  that  drug- 
ging, which  the  people  of  India  have  always  had  a  good 
deal  of  recourse  to  among  themselves,  is  now  brought 
to  bear  occasionally  upon  Anglo-Indians  also,  when 
there  is  any  motive  for  its  use,  and  where  covering  cir- 
cumstances exist.  It  may  seem  easy  to  people  who  have 
never  tried  it,  and  have  never  had  any  reason  to  do  so, 
to  determine  whether  or  not  poisonous  drugs  have  been 
administered  to  them  ;  but  they  will  find  that  just  as 
difficult  as  to  dismount  from  a  horse  when  it  is  eoine 
over  a  precipice.  Such  is  the  fact  even  where  the  poison 
is  one  which  can  be  detected,  but  that  is  not  always  the 
case  ;  and,  in  particular,  there  is  a  plant  which  grows  in 
almost  every  compound  in  India,  a  decoction  of  the 
seeds  of  one  variety  of  which  will  produce  delirium  and 
death  without  leaving  any  trace  of  its  presence  behind. 
The  pounded  seeds  themselves  are  sometimes  given  in 
curry  with  similar  effect,  but  these  can  be  detected,  and 
it  is  a  decoction  from  them  which  is  specially  dangerous. 
Entertaining  such  views,  it  appeared  to  me  quite  possible 
that  some  of  the  people  about  me  might  be  disposed  not 
so  much  to  poison  me  as  to  arrest  my  journey  by  means 
of  drugs,  whether  to  put  an  end  to  what  had  become  to 
them  a  trying  and  hateful  journey,  or  in  answer  to  the 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNO IV. 


bribery  of  agents  of  the  Lassa  Government,  whose  busi- 
ness it  is  to  prevent  Europeans  passing  the  border.  I 
don't  suppose  any  one  who  started  with  me  from  Simla, 
or  saw  me  start,  expected  that  I  should  get  up  very 
far  among  the  mountains  ;  and  indeed,  Major  Fenwick 
politely  told  me  that  I  should  get  eaten  up.  A  nice 
little  trip  along  a  cut  road,  stopping  a  week  at  a  bunga- 
low here  and  another  bungalow  there,  was  all  very  well ; 
but  this  going  straight  up,  heaven  knew  where,  into  the 
face  of  stupendous  snowy  mountains,  up  and  down  pre- 
cipices, and  among  a  Tartar  people,  was  more  than  was 
ever  seriously  bargained  for. 

I  could  not,  then,  in  the  least  wonder,  or  think  it  un- 
likely, that  when  it  was  found  I  was  going  beyond  Pan- 
gay,  some  attempt  might  be  made  to  disable  me  a  little, 
though  without  any  intention  of  doing  me  serious  injury. 
However,  I  cannot  speak  with  any  certainty  on  that 
subject.  If  the  illness  which  I  had  at  Pangay  was  not 
the  producing  cause  of  the  dysentery,  it  at  least  pre- 
pared the  way  for  it.  What  was  certain  at  Lippe  was, 
that  I  had  to  meet  a  violent  attack  of  one  of  the  most 
dangerous  and  distressing  of  diseases.  Unfortunately, 
also,  I  had  no  medicine  suited  for  it  except  a  little 
morphia,  taken  in  case  of  an  accident.  Somehow,  it 
had  never  occurred  to  me  that  there  was  any  chance  of 
my  suffering  from  true  dysentery  among  the  mountains; 
and  all  the  cases  I  have  been  able  to  hear  of  there,  were 
those  of  people  who  had  brought  it  up  with  them  from 
the  plains.  I  was  determined  not  to  go  back — not  to 
turn  on  my  journey,  whatever  I  did  ;  and  it  occurred  to 
me  that  Air  Pagell,  the  Moravian  missionary  stationed 
at  Pu,  near  the  Chinese  border,  and  to  whom  I  had  a 
letter  of  introduction  from  Mr  Chapman,  would  be  likely 
to  have  the  medicines  which  were  all  I  required  in  order 
to  treat  myself  effectually.      But  Pu  was  several  days' 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHA  DO  IV  OF  DEATH.  99 

journey  off,  more  or  less,  according  to  the  more  or  less 
bad  road  which  might  be  followed-;  and  the  difficulty 
was  how  to  get  there  alive,  so  rapidly  did  the  dysentery 
develop  itself,  and  so  essential  is  complete  repose  in 
order  to  deal  with  it  under  even  the  most  favourable 
circumstances.  The  morphia  did  not  check  it  in  the 
least.  Chlorodyne  I  was  afraid  to  touch,  owing  to  its 
irritant  quality;  and  I  notice  that  Mr  Henry  Stanley 
found  not  the  least  use  from  treating  himself  with  it  when 
suffering  from  dysentery  in  Africa,  though  it  is  often 
very  good  for  diarrhoea. 

The  next  day's  journey,  from  Lippe  to  Sugnam, 
would  have  been  no  joke  even  for  an  Alpine  Clubsman. 
It  is  usually  made  in  two  days'  journey ;  but  by  send- 
ing forward  in  advance,  and  having  coolies  from  Lab- 
rang  and  Kanam  ready  for  us  half-way,  we  managed  to 
accomplish  it  in  one  day  of  twelve  hours'  almost  con- 
tinuous work.  The  path  went  over  the  Ruhang  or 
Roonang  Pass,  which  is  14,354  ^eet  high  ;  and  as  Lippe 
and  Sugnam  are  about  9000  feet  high,  that  would  give 
an  ascent  and  descent  of  about  5300  feet  each.  But 
there  are  two  considerable  descents  to  be  made  on  the 
way  from  Lippe  to  the  summit  of  the  pass,  and  a 
smaller  descent  before  reaching  Sugnam,  so  that  the 
Ruhang  Pass  really  involves  an  ascent  of  over  8000 
feet,  and  a  descent  of  the  same  number. 

Here,  for  the  first  time,  I  saw  and  made  use  of  the 
yak  or  wild  ox  of  Tibet,  the  Bos  grunnicns,  or  grunting 
ox,  the  Bos  poephagus  and  the  Troi<payos  of  Arrian.  It 
certainly  is  a  magnificent  animal,  and  one  of  the  finest 
creatures  of  the  bovine  species.  In  the  Zoological 
Gardens  at  Schonbrunn,  near  Vienna,  there  are  some 
specimens  of  yaks  from  Siberia  ;  but  they  are  small, 
and  are  not  to  be  compared  with  the  great  yak  of  the 
Himaliya,  the  back  of  which  is  more  like  an  elephant's 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


than  anything  else.  The  shortness  of  its  legs  takes 
away  somewhat  from  its  stature ;  and  so  does  its  thick 
covering  of  fine  black  and  white  hair,  but  that  adds 
greatly  to  its  beauty.  Indeed,  it  is  the  shaggy  hair  and 
savage  eye  of  the  yak  which  make  its  appearance  so 
striking,  for  the  head  is  not  large,  and  the  horns  are 
poor.  The  tail  is  a  splendid  feature,  and  the  white  tails 
of  yaks  are  valuable  as  articles  of  commerce.  The  zo-po, 
on  which  I  often  rode,  is  a  hybrid  between  the  yak 
and  the  female  Bos  Indicus,  or  common  Indian  cow.  It 
is  considered  more  docile  than  the  yak,  and  its  appear- 
ance is  often  very  beautiful.  Curiously  enough,  when 
the  yak  and  the  zo-po  are  taken  to  the  plains  of  India, 
or  even  to  the  Kulu  valley,  which  is  over  3000  feet  high, 
they  die  of  liver-disease  ;  and  they  can  flourish  only  in 
cold  snowy  regions.  I  was  not  fortunate  enough  to  see 
any  of  the  wild  yaks,  which  are  said  to  exist  on  the 
plains  of  the  upper  Sutlej  in  Chinese  Tibet,  and  in  some 
parts  of  Ladak.  I  heard,  however,  of  their  being  shot, 
and  that  the  way  this  was  accomplished  was  by  two 
holes  in  the  ground,  communicating  with  each  other 
beneath,  being  prepared  for  the  hunter  in  some  place 
where  these  animals  are  likely  to  pass.  If  the  wild  yak 
is  only  wounded,  it  rushes,  in  its  fury,  to  the  hole  from 
whence  the  shot  came,  on  which  the  hunter  raises 
his  head  and  gun  out  of  the  other  hole  and  fires 
again.  This  rather  ignoble  game  may  go  on  for  some 
time,  and  the  yak  is  described  as  being  in  a  frenzy  of 
rage,  trampling  in  the  sides  of  the  holes  and  tearing  at 
them  with  its  horns.  Even  the  yaks  of  burden,  which 
have  been  domesticated,  or  rather  half  domesticated,  for 
generations,  are  exceedingly  wild,  and  the  only  way 
they  can  be  managed  is  by  a  rope  attached  by  a  ring 
through  the  nose.  I  had  scarcely  had  time  at  Lippe  to 
admire  the  yak  which  was  brought  for  my  use,  than,  the 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH  101 

man  in  charge  having  dropped  this  rope,  it  made  a 
furious  charge  at  me  ;  and  I  found  afterwards  that  yaks 
invariably  did  this  whenever  they  got  a  chance.  I  can- 
not say  whether  this  was  done  because  I  was  evidently 
a  stranger,  or  because  they  regarded  me  as  the  cause  of 
all  their  woes  ;  but  certainly,  as  we  went  up  that  ter- 
rible and  apparently  endless  Ruhang  Pass,  with  one 
man  pulling  at  the  yak's  nose-ring  in  front,  and  another 
progging  it  behind  with  the  iron  shod  of  my  alpenstock, 
the  Bos grunnicns  had  an  uncommonly  hard  time  of  it, 
especially  when  he  tried  to  stop  ;  he  did  not  keep 
grunting  without  good  reason  therefore;  and  I  could 
not  help  thinking  that  my  Poephagus  had  been  per- 
fectly justified  in  his  attempt  to  demolish  me  before 
starting. 

If  my  reader  wants  to  get  an  idea  of  the  comfort  of 
riding  upon  a  yak,  let  him  fasten  two  Prussian  spiked 
helmets  close  together  along  the  back  of  a  great  bull, 
and  seat  himself  between  them.  That  is  the  nearest 
idea  I  can  give  of  a  yak's  saddle,  only  it  must  be 
understood  that  the  helmets  are  connected  on  each  side 
by  ribs  of  particularly  hard  wood.  The  sure-footed- 
ness  and  the  steady  though  slow  ascent  of  these  animals 
up  the  most  difficult  passes  are  very  remarkable.  They 
never  rest  upon  a  leg  until  they  are  sure  they  have  got 
a  fair  footing  for  it ;  and,  heavy  as  they  appear,  they 
will  carry  burdens  up  places  which  even  the  ponies  and 
mules  of  the  Alps  would  not  attempt.  There  is  a  cer- 
tain sense  of  safety  in  being  on  the  back  of  a  yak  among 
these  mountains,  such  as  one  has  in  riding  on  an  ele- 
phant in  a  tiger-hunt  ;  you  feel  that  nothing  but  a  very 
large  rock,  or  the  fall  of  half  a  mountain,  or  something 
of  that' kind,  will  make  it  lose  its  footing;  but  it  does 
require  some  time  for  the  physical  man  to  get  accus- 
tomed to  its  saddle,  to  its  broad  back,  and  to  its  delibe- 


102  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

rate  motion  when  its  rider  is  upon  it,  and  not  in   a 
position  to  be  charged  at. 

So  up  I  went  on  a  yak  along  a  most  curious  pathway 
which  slanted  across  the  face  of  an  immense  slate  preci- 
pice. From  below  it  appeared  impossible  for  any  man 
or  animal  to  pass  along  it,  and  sometimes  I  had  to  dis- 
mount, and  even  the  saddle  had  to  be  taken  off  my 
bulky  steed,  in  order  that  it  might  find  room  to  pass. 
From  the  top  of  this  precipice  there  was  a  descent  of 
about  800  feet,  and  then  a  tremendous  pull  up  to  what 
I  fancied  was  the  top  of  the  pass,  but  which  was  far 
from  being  anything  of  the  kind.  The  path  then  ran 
along  a  ridge  of  slate  at  an  elevation  of  about  13.000 
feet,  affording  most  splendid  views  both  of  the  Morang 
Kailas  and  of  the  great  mountains  within  the  Lassa 
territory.  After  a  gradual  descent,  we  came  upon  an 
alp  or  grassy  slope,  where  we  were  met  by  people  from 
Labrang  and  Kanam,  all  in  their  best  attire,  to  conduct 
us  the  remainder  of  the  way  to  Sugnam.  These  moun- 
taineers, some  of  whom  were  rather  good-looking  women, 
tendered  their  assistance  rather  as  an  act  of  hospitality 
than  as  a  paid  service  ;  and  the  money  they  were  to 
receive  could  hardly  compensate  them  for  the  labour  of 
the  journey.  There  is  a  Lama  monastery  at  Kanam,  in 
which  the  Hungarian  Csomo  de  Koros  lived  for  a  long 
time  when  he  commenced  his  studies  of  the  Tibetan 
language  and  literature.  It  is  well  known  now  that  the 
Magyars  are  a  Tartar  race,  and  that  their  language  is 
a  Tartar  language  ;  but  thirty  years  ago  that  was  only 
beginning  to  appear,  so  Csomo  de  Koros  wandered  east- 
ward in  search  of  the  congeners  of  his  countrymen. 
At  that  time  Central  Asia  was  more  open  to  Europeans 
than  it  has  been  of  late  years  ;  so  he  came  by  way  of 
Kaubul,  and,  on  entering  the  inner  Himaliya,  found  so 
many  affinities  between  the  Tibetan  language  and  that 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  103 

of  his  countrymen,  that  he  concluded  he  had  discovered 
the  original  stem  of  the  Magyar  race.  Years  were 
passed  by  him  at  Kanam,  and  at  the  still  more  secluded 
monastery  of  Kingdom,  where  I  found  he  was  well  re- 
membered ;  and  he  made  himself  a  master  of  the  Lama 
religion  and  of  the  Tibetan  language,  besides  preparing 
a  number  of  manuscripts  regarding  the  Tibetan  litera- 
ture. But  this  did  not  content  him,  for  he  was  anxious 
to  penetrate  into  Chinese  Tibet  as  far  as  Lassa  ;  and 
finding  all  his  efforts  to  do  so  from  Kunawar  were  frus- 
trated, he  went  down  into  India,  and  ascended  the 
Himaliya  again  at  Darjiling,  with  the  intention  of  pene- 
trating into  Tibet  from  that  point  in  disguise.  At  Dar- 
jiling, however,  he  died  suddenly — whether  from  the 
effects  of  passing  through  the  Terai,  or  from  poison,  or 
from  what  cause,  no  one  can  say,  nor  have  I  been  able 
to  learn  what  became  of  his  manuscripts.  I  suppose 
nobody  at  Darjiling  knew  anything  about  him  ;  and  Dr 
Stoliczka  told  me  he  had  met  some  Hungarians  who 
had  come  to  India  in  search  of  their  lost  relative  Csomo, 
and  it  was  only  by  some  accident  he  was  able  to  tell 
them  where  the  Hungarian  they  sought  was  buried. 
Csomo  de  Koros  published  at  Calcutta  a  Tibetan 
Grammar  in  English,  and  also  a  Tibetan-English  Dic- 
tionary ;  but  he  had  so  far  been  anticipated  by  J.  J. 
Schmidt,  who  issued  at  Leipsic,  in  1841,  a  "  Tibetisch- 
Deutsches  Worterbuch,  nebst  Deutschem  Wortregister." 
This  Schmidt  was  a  merchant  in  Russia,  at  Sarepta, 
near  the  Volga,  where  he  learned  the  Mongolian  lan- 
guage, and  then,  from  the  Mongolian  Lamas,  acquired 
the  Tibetan,  after  which  the  Russian  Government  called 
him  to  St  Petersburg,  where  he  published  Mongolian 
and  Tibetan  Grammars.  A  small  but  convenient  litho- 
graphed Tibetan  Grammar  in  English,  and  a  Tibetan- 
English  Vocabulary,  were  prepared  some  years  ago  by 


104  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

the  Rev.  Mr  Jaschke,  of  the  Moravian  Mission  at  Kae- 
lang,  in  Lahoul ;  but  the  latter  of  these  will  ere  long  be 
superseded  by  the  elaborate  and  most  valuable  Tibetan- 
German  and  Tibetan-English  Dictionaries,  with  registers, 
which  this  gentleman  is  now  preparing  and  passing 
through  the  press  from  his  present  residence  at  Herrn- 
hut,  in  Saxony,  the  original  and  central  settlement  of 
the  Moravian  Brethren.  I  had  the  pleasure  of  meeting 
with  Herr  Jaschke  at  Herrnhut  a  short  time  ago,  and 
found  him  far  advanced  with  his  Dictionaries  ;  and  may 
mention  that  sheets  of  them,  so  far  as  they  have  been 
printed,  are  to  be  found  in  the  East  India  Office  Library. 
But  we  are  not  at  Herrnhut  just  now,  but  on  a  cold 
windy  plateau  13,000  feet  high,  with  a  gradual  de- 
scent before  us  to  some  white  granite  and  mica-slate 
precipices,  which  have  to  be  painfully  climbed  up  ;  while 
beyond,  a  steep  and  terribly  long  ascent  leads  up  to  a 
great  bank  of  snow,  which  must  be  crossed  before  it 
is  possible  to  commence  the  5500  feet  of  descent  upon 
Sugnam.  Feeling  myself  becoming  weaker  every  hour, 
I  must  confess  that  my  heart  almost  failed  me  at  this 
prospect ;  but  to  have  remained  at  that  altitude  in  the 
state  I  was  in  would  have  been  death  ;  so,  after  hastily 
drinking  some  milk,  which  the  pretty  Kanam  women 
had  been  considerate  enough  to  bring  with  them,  we 
pushed  on.  No  yaks  could  go  up  the  white  precipice, 
and  there  was  nothing  for  it  there  but  climbing  with 
such  aid  as  ropes  could  give.  High  as  we  were,  the 
heat  and  glare  of  the  sun  on  these  rocks  was  frightful ; 
but  as  we  got  up  the  long  slope  beyond,  and  approached 
the  bank  of  snow,  the  sky  darkened,  and  an  intensely 
cold  and  violent  wind  swept  over  the  summit  of  the  pass 
from  the  fields  of  ice  and  snow  around.  There  was  no 
difficulty  in  passing  the  bank  of  snow,  which  turned  out 
to  be  only  patches  of  snow  with  a  bare  path  between 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  105 

them;  but  at  that  height  of  14,354  ^eet.  or  nearly  as 
high  as  the  summit  of  Mont  Blanc,  with  its  rarefied  air, 
the  effect  of  the  violent  icy  wind  was  almost  killing,  and 
we  could  not  halt  for  a  moment  on  the  summit  of  the 
pass  or  till  we  got  hundreds  of  feet  below  it.  Hitherto 
I  had  been  able  to  make  little  use  of  my  dandy,  but 
now  I  could  do  little  more  than  stick  to  it.  This  was 
very  hard  on  the  bearers,  who  were  totally  unused  to 
the  work.  One  poor  man,  after  a  little  experience  of 
carrying  me,  actually  roared  and  cried,  the  tears  plough- 
ing through  the  dirt  of  ages  upon  his  cheeks  (for  these 
people  never  wash),  like  mountain  torrents  down  slopes 
of  dried  mud.  He  seemed  so  much  distressed,  that  I 
allowed  him  to  carry  one  of  the  kiltas  instead  ;  on  which 
the  other  men  told  him  that  he  would  have  to  be  con- 
tent with  two  annas  (threepence)  instead  of  four,  which 
each  bearer  was  to  receive.  To  this  he  replied  that 
they  might  keep  all  the  four  annas  to  themselves,  for 
not  forty  times  four  would  reconcile  him  to  the  work  of 
carrying  the  dandy.  But  the  other  men  bore  up  most 
manfully  under  an  infliction  which  they  must  have 
regarded  as  sent  to  them  by  the  very  devil  of  devils. 
They  were  zemindars,  too,  or  small  proprietors,  well  off 
in  the  world,  with  flocks  and  herds  of  their  own  ;  and 
yet,  for  sixpence,  they  had  to  carry  me  (suspended  from 
a  long  bamboo,  which  tortured  their  unaccustomed 
shoulders,  and  knocked  them  off  their  footing  every 
now  and  then)  down  a  height  of  between  7COO  and  8000 
feet,  along  a  steep  corkscrew  track,  over  shingle  and 
blocks  of  granite.  How  trifling  these  charges  are, 
though  the  work  is  so  much  more  severe,  compared 
with  the  six  francs  a  day  we  have  to  give  to  a  Swiss 
portatina  or  chaise  d  pqrteur,  with  three  francs  for  back 
fare,  and  the  six  or  eight  francs  for  a  guide  on  ordinary 
excursions!     Meanwhile,  the  individual  suspended  from 


106  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

the  bamboo  was  in  scarcely  a  happier  plight.  I  could 
not  help  remembering  a  prediction  of  Lieutenant- 
Colonel  Moore's,  that  if  I  ever  did  reach  Kashmir,  or 
anywhere,' \\.  would  be  suspended  by  the  heels  and  neck 
from  a  bamboo,  with  tongue  hanging  out  of  my  mouth, 
and  eyes  starting  from  their  sockets.  Things  certainly 
had  an  unpleasant  appearance  of  coming  to  that  pass, 
and  this  reflection  enabled  me  to  endure  the  suffering 
of  the  dandy-wallahs  with  some  equanimity.  Fortun- 
ately, till  we  got  near  to  Sugnam,  there  was  no  precipice 
for  them  to  drop  me  over  ;  and  when  we  at  last  reached 
one,  and  had  to  pass  along  the  edge  of  it,  I  got  out  and 
walked  as  well  as  I  could,  for  I  felt  convinced  that  out- 
raged human  nature  could  not  have  resisted  the  temp- 
tation ;  and  I  also  took  the  precaution  of  keeping  the 
most  valuable  looking  man  of  the  party  in  front  of  me 
with  my  hand  resting  on  his  shoulder. 

There  is  a  route  from  Sugnam  to  Pu,  by  Lio  and 
Chango,  which  takes  over  two  14,000  feet  passes,  and 
probably  would  have  been  the  best  for  me  ;  but  we 
had  had  enough  of  14,000  feet  for  the  time  being,  and 
so  I  chose  another  route  by  Shaso,  which  was  repre- 
sented as  shorter,  but  hard.  It  was  a  very  small  day's 
journey  from  Sugnam  (which  is  a  large  and  very 
wealthy  village,  inhabited  by  Tartars)  to  Shaso,  and 
the  road  was  not  particularly  bad,  though  I  had  to  be 
carried  across  precipitous  slopes  where  there  was 
scarcely  footing  for  the  dandy-wallahs.  My  servants 
had  not  recovered  the  Ruhang  Pass,  however ;  and  I 
was  so  ill  that  I  also  was  glad  to  rest  the  next  day  at 
this  strange  little  village  in  order  to  prepare  for  the  for- 
midable day's  journey  to  Pu.  Shaso  consists  of  only  a 
few  houses  and  narrow  terraced  fields  on  the  left  bank 
of  the  Darbung  Liing-pa,  with  gigantic  and  almost  pre- 
cipitous   mountains    shading   it   on    either  side    of  the 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  107 

stream.  My  tent  was  pitched  on  a  narrow  strip  of 
grass  amid  large  willow-trees,  apricot-trees,  and  vines, 
which  promised  to  bear  a  plentiful  crop  of  large  purple 
grapes.  It  was  here  I  engaged  the  services  of  the  youth 
Nurdass,  who  proved  so  useful  to  me  on  my  further 
journey.  A  boy,  to  be  generally  useful,  had  been 
engaged  at  Kotgarh ;  and  as  no  one  except  himself 
could  pronounce  his  name  or  anything  like  it,  he  was 
dubbed  "the  Chokra,"  or  simply  boy.  Of  all  things  in 
the  world,  he  offered  himself  as  a  dJwbi  or  washerman, 
for  certainly  his  washing  did  not  begin  at  home  ;  and 
he  disappeared  mysteriously  the  morning  after  his  first 
attempt  in  that  line,  and  after  we  had  gone  only  six 
marches.  Some  clothes  were  given  him  to  wash  at 
Nachar  ;  and  whether  it  was  the  contemplation  of  these 
clothes  after  he  had  washed  them — a  process  which  he 
prolonged  far  into  the  night — or  that  he  found  the 
journey  and  his  work  too  much  for  him,  or,  as  some 
one  said,  he  had  seen  a  creditor  to  whom  he  owed  five 
rupees, — at  all  events,  when  we  started  in  the  morning 
no  Chokra  was  visible,  and  the  only  information  about 
him  we  could  get  was  that  he  was  udher  gya — "gone 
there  " — our  informant  pointing  up  to  a  wilderness  of 
forest,  rock,  and  snow.  Nurdass  was  a  very  different 
and  much  superior  sort  of  youth.  His  father — or  at 
least  his  surviving  father,  for,  though  inhabited  by  an 
outlying  colony  of  Hindu  Kunaits,  polyandry  flourishes 
in  Shaso — was  a  doctor  as  well  as  a  small  proprietor, 
and  his  son  had  received  such  education  as  could  be  grot 
among  the  mountains.  The  youth,  or  boy  as  he  looked 
though  fifteen  years  old,  spoke  Hindusthani  very  well, 
as  also  Kunawari,  and  yet  was  never  at  a  loss  with  any 
of  the  Tibetan  dialects  we  came  to.  He  could  go  up 
mountains  like  a  wild  cat,  was  not  afraid  to  mount  any 
horse,  and  though  he  had  never  even  seen  a  wheeled 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNO  W. 


carriage  until  we  got  to  the  plains  of  India,  yet  amid 
the  bustle  and  confusion  of  the  railway  stations  he  was 
cool  and  collected  as  possible,  and  learned  immediately 
what  to  do  there.     He  was  equally  af  home  in  a  small 
boat  on  a  rough  day  in  Bombay  harbour;  and  after  see- 
ing  three   steamers,   compared   them   as   critically  with 
one  another  as  if  he  had  been  brought  up  to  the  iron- 
trade,   though   there   was  nothing   of  the  conceited  nil 
admirari  of  the  Chinaman  about  him,  and  he  was  full 
of  wonder  and  admiration.      It  was  really  a  bold   thing 
for  a  little  mountain  youth  of  this  kind  to  commit  him- 
self to  an  indefinitely  long  journey  with  people  whom, 
with  the  exception  of  Phooleyram,  he  had  never  seen 
before.      His  motive  for  doing  so  was  a  desire  to  see  the 
world   and   a  hope  of  bettering  his  condition  in  it,  for 
there  was  no  necessity  for  him  to  leave  Shaso.     There 
was   great  lamentation  when   he  left ;   his   mother  and 
sisters  caressing  him,  and  weeping  over  him,  and    be- 
seeching  us  to   take   good   care   of  him.     The  original 
idea  was  that  Nurdass  should  return  to  the  Sutlej  valley 
along    with   Phooleyram,    when    that    casteman   of  his 
should  leave  us,  whether  in  Spiti  or  Kashmir.     But  in 
Chinese  Tibet  Phooleyram  pulled  the  little  fellow's  ears 
one  night,   and,   in   defence   of  this,    most  gratuitously 
accused  him  of  being  tipsy,  when,  if  anybody  had  been 
indulging,  it  was  only  the  Munshi  himself.     This  made 
me  doubtful  about  sending  him  back  the  long  way  from 
Kashmir  to   the   Sutlej   in   company  with    Phooleyram 
alone;  and  on  speaking  to  him  on  the  subject,  I  found 
that  he  was  quite  frightened  at  the  prospect,  and  was 
not  only  willing  but  eager  to  go  with  me  to  Bombay, — 
both  because  he  wished  to  see  a  place  of  which  he  had 
heard    so    much,  and    because    the    season  was   so    far 
advanced  he  was  afraid  he  might  not  be  able  to  reach 
his    own    home    before  spring.      So   Nurdass   came  on 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.  109 

with  me  to  Bombay,  where  he  excited  much  interest 
by  his  intelligence  and  open  disposition  ;  and  I  might 
have  taken  him  on  farther  with  me  had  he  been  inclined 
to  go ;  but  he  said  that,  though  he  was  not  afraid  of  the 
kala  pani,  or  dark  water,  yet  he  would  rather  not  go 
with  me  then,  because  he  had  made  a  long  enough 
journey  from  his  own  country,  and  seen  enough  wonders 
for  the  first  time.  Several  distinguished  persons  on  our 
way  down  wished  to  take  him  into  their  employment ; 
but  one  day  he  came  to  me  crying,  with  his  hand  upon 
his  heart,  saying  that  there  was  something  there  which 
made  him  ill,  and  that  he  would  die  unless  he  got  back 
to  his  own  paliar,  or  mountains.  He  could  not  have 
heard  of  the  JicimzveJi  of  the  Swiss,  and  I  was  struck  by 
his  reference  to  the  mountains  in  particular.  There  was 
evidently  no  affectation  in  the  feelings  he  expressed  ; 
so,  knowing  his  wonderful  cleverness  as  a  traveller,  but 
taking  various  precautions  for  his  safety,  which  was 
likely  to  be  endangered  by  his  confidence  in  mankind, 
I  sent  him  back  from  Bombay  alone  to  the  Himaliya, 
and  have  been  glad  to  hear  of  his  having  reached  Kot- 
garh,  without  any  mishap,  where,  I  am  sure,  the  kind- 
hearted  Mr  Rebsch  would  see  that  he  was  safely  con- 
voyed to  his  little  village  high  up  among  the  great 
mountains. 

Thus  reinforced  by  a  small  but  mighty  man,  we 
started  from  Shaso  at  five  in  the  morning  of  the  4th 
July,  and  I  managed  to  reach  Pu  at  seven  that  night, 
more  dead  than  alive.  The  distance  was  only  fourteen 
miles,  and  the  two  first  and  the  last  two  were  so  easy 
that  I  was  carried  over  them  in  my  dandy  ;  but  the 
intervening  ten  were  killing  to  one  in  my  condition,  for 
the  dandy  was  of  no  use  upon  them,  and  I  had  to  trust 
entirely  to  my  own  hands  and  feet.  These  ten  miles 
took  me  exactly  twelve  hours,  with  only  half  an  hour's 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


rest.     The  fastest  of  my  party  took  nine  hours  to  the 
whole  distance,  so  that  I   must  have  gone  wonderfully 
fast  considering  that  I   had  rheumatism  besides  dysen- 
tery, and  could  take  nothing  except  a  very  little  milk, 
either  before  starting  or  on  the  way.     The  track — for  it 
could  not  be  called  a  path,  and  even  goats  could  hardly 
have  got  along  many  parts  of  it — ran  across  the  face  of 
tremendous  slate  precipices,  which  rose  up  thousands  of 
feet   from  the   foaming  and  thundering  Sutlej.      Some 
rough  survey  of  these  dJiung  or  cliffs  was  made,  when  it 
was   proposed   to   continue   the   Hindusthan  and  Tibet 
road  beyond  Pangay,  a  project  which  has  never  been 
carried    out ;  and   Mr  Cregeen,  executive  engineer,  says 
of  them,  in  No.  CLXVI.  of  the  "  Professional  Papers  on 
Indian  Engineering,"  "in  the  fifth   march  to  Spooi,*  the 
road  must  be  taken  across  the  cliffs  which  here  line  the 
right  bank  of  the  Sutlej   in  magnificent  wildness.     The 
native  track  across   these   cliffs,  about   1500  feet  above 
the  crossing  for  the  Hindusthan  and  Tibet  road,  is  con- 
sidered  the  worst   footpath    in    Bussahir.     This   march 
will,   I   think,  be  the  most  expensive  on  the  road  ;  the 
whole  of  the  cutting  will  be  through  hard  rock."     Any 
one  who  has  had  some  experience  of  the  footpaths  in 
Bussahir  may  conceive  what  the  worst  of  them  is  likely 
to  be,  but  still  he  may  be  unable  to  comprehend  how  it 
is  possible  to  get  along  faces  of  hard  rock,  thousands  of 
feet  above  their  base,  when  there  has  been  no  cutting  or 
blasting  either.     It  must  be  remembered,  however,  that 
though  the  precipices  of  the  Himaliya  look  almost  per- 
pendicular from  points  where  their  entire  gigantic  pro- 

*  Fu  is  the  name  of  this  place,  but  the  natives  sometimes  call  it  Pui,  the 
i  being  added  merely  for  the  sake  of  euphony,  as  the  Chinese  sometimes 
change  Shu,  water,  into  Shui.  In  the  Trigonometrical  Survey  map  it  has 
been  transformed  into  Spuch.  Where  Mr  Cregeen  found  his  version  of  it 
I  cannot  conceive. 


VALLE Y  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEA TH.  1 1 1 

portions  can  be  seen,  yet,  on  a  closer  examination,  it 
turns  out  that  they  are  not  quite  perpendicular,  and 
have  many  ledges  which  can  be  taken  advantage  of  by 
the  traveller. 

In  this  case  the  weather  had  worn  away  the  softer 
parts  of  the  slate,  leaving  the  harder  ends  sticking  out  ; 
and  I  declare  that  these,  with  the  addition  of  a  few  ropes 
of  juniper-branches,  were  the  only  aids  we  had  along 
many  parts  of  these  precipices  when  I  crossed  them. 
Where  the  protruding  ends  of  slate  were  close  together, 
long  slabs  of  slate  were  laid  across  them,  forming  a  sort 
of  footpath  such  as  might  suit  a  chamois-hunter  ;  when 
they  were  not  sufficiently  in  line,  or  were  too  far  distant 
from  each  other,  to  allow  of  slabs  being  placed,  we 
worked  our  way  from  one  protruding  end  of  slate  to 
another  as  best  we  could  ;  and  where  a  long  interval  of 
twenty  or  thirty  feet  did  not  allow  of  this  latter  method 
of  progress,  ropes  of  twisted  juniper-branches  had  been 
stretched  from  one  protruding  end  to  another,  and  slabs 
of  slate  had  been  placed  on  these,  with  their  inner  ends 
resting  on  any  crevices  which  could  be  found  in  the  pre- 
cipice wall,  thus  forming  a  "footpath"  with  great  gaps 
in  it,  through  which  we  could  look  down  sometimes  a 
long  distance,  and  which  bent  and  shook  beneath  our 
feet,  allowing  the  slabs  every  now  and  then  to  drop  out 
and  fall  towards  the  Sutlej,  till  shattered  into  innumer- 
able fragments.  It  was  useless  attempting  to  rely  on  a 
rope  at  many  of  these  places,  for  the  men  who  would 
have  had  to  hold  the  rope  could  hardly  have  found  a 
position  from  which  to  stand  the  least  strain.  Indeed, 
the  worst  danger  I  met  with  was  from  a  man  officiously 
trying  to  help  me  on  one  of  these  juniper-bridges,  with 
the  result  of  nearly  bringing  the  whole  concern  down. 
And  if  slabs  of  slate  went  out  from  underneath  our  feet, 
not  less  did  slabs  of  slate  come  crashing  down  over  and 


U2  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

between  our  heads  occasionally  ;  for  it  seemed  to  me 
that  the  whole  of  that  precipice  had  got  into  the  habit 
of  detaching  itself  in  fragments  into  the  river  beneath. 
I  may  add,  that  having  sent  my  servants  on  in  front — 
to  set  up  my  tent  and  make  other  preparations  in  case 
of  Mr  Pagell  being  away,  of  which  I  had  heard  a  ru- 
mour—  I  was  entirelv  in  the  hands  of  the  Sugnam  bigar- 
ries,  of  whose  Tebarskad  I  hardly  understood  a  word  ; 
and  that  the  July  sun  beat  upon  the  slate,  so  that  every 
breath  from  the  rock  was  sickening.  Beneath,  there 
were  dark  jagged  precipices,  and  an  almost  sunless 
torrent — so  deeply  is  the  Sutlej  here  sunk  in  its  gorge — 
foaming  along  at  the  rate  of  about  twenty  miles  an 
hour ;  above  there  were  frowning  precipices  and  a 
cloudless  sky,  across  which  some  eagle  or  huge  raven- 
like Himaliyan  crow  occasionally  flitted. 

I  saw  this  footpath  in  an  exceptionally  bad  stats — for 
it  is  only  used  in  winter  when  the  higher  roads  are  im- 
passable from  snow  ;  and  after  all  the  damage  of  winter 
and  spring,  it  is  not  repaired  until  the  beginning  of 
winter.  But  no  repairing,  short  of  blasting  out  galleries 
in  the  face  of  the  rock,  could  make  much  improvement 
in  it.  It  was  not,  however,  the  danger  of  this  path 
which  made  it  frightful  to  me  ;  that  only  made  it  inter- 
esting, and  served  as  a  stimulus.  The  mischief  was  that, 
in  my  disabled  and  weak  state,  I  had  to  exert  myself 
almost  continuously  on  it  for  twelve  hours  in  a  burning 
sun.  The  Sugnam  men  did  all  in  their  power  to  assist 
me,  and  I  could  not  but  admire,  and  be  deeply  grateful 
for,  their  patience  and  kindness.  But  the  longest  day 
has  an  end,  as  Damiens  said  when  he  was  taken  out  to 
be  tortured  ;  and  we  reached  Pu  at  last,  my  bearers, 
as  they  approached  it,  sending  up  sounds  not  unlike 
the  Swiss  jodel,  which  were  replied  to  in  similar  fashion 
by  their  companions  who  had  reached  the  place  before 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.        113 

them.  Pu  is  a  large  village,  situated  about  a  thousand 
feet  above  the  bed  of  the  Sutlej,  on  the  slope  of  a  high, 
steep  mountain.  I  found  that  my  tent  had  been  pitched 
on  a  long  terraced  field,  well  shaded  with  apricot-trees, 
on  the  outskirts  of  the  village,  and  that  Mr  Pagell,  the 
Moravian  missionary,  was  absent  on  a  long  journey  he 
was  making  in  Spiti.  Mrs  Pagell,  it  appeared,  was 
living  with  some  native  Christians  near  by,  in  a  house 
guarded  by  ferocious  dogs  ;  but  as  she  spoke  neither 
English  nor  Hindusthani,  only  German  and  Tibetan, 
Silas  had  been  unable  to  communicate  with  her,  and  the 
use  of  Nurdass  as  an  interpreter  had  not  then  been  dis- 
covered. This  was  serious  news  for  a  man  in  my  con- 
dition ;  but  I  was  in  too  deathlike  a  state  to  do  any- 
thing, and  lying  down  in  my  tent,  did  not  make  any 
attempt  to  leave  it  until  the  day  after  next. 

When  able,  I  staggered  up  to  Mrs  Pagell's  residence, 
and  explained  the  position  I  was  in.  She  at  once  gave 
me  access  to  her  husband's  store  of  medicines,  where  I 
found  all  I  required  to  treat  myself  with — calomel,  steel, 
chalk,  Dover's  powder,  and,  above  all,  pure  ipecacuanha, 
which  nauseous  medicine  was  to  me  like  a  spring  of 
living  water  in  a  dry  and  thirsty  land,  for  I  knew  well 
that  it  was  the  only  drug  to  be  relied  on  for  dysentery. 
This  good  Moravian  sister  was  distressed  at  having  no 
proper  accommodation  in  her  house  for  me  ;  but,  other- 
wise, she  placed  all  its  resources  at  my  disposal,  and 
soon  sent  off  a  letter  to  be  forwarded  from  village  to 
village  in  search  of  her  husband.  Considering  that,  in 
ten  years,  Mrs  Pagell  had  seldom  seen  a  European,  it 
was  only  to  be  expected  that  she  should  be  a  little  flus- 
tered and  at  a  loss  what  to  do  ;  but  her  kindness  was 
genuine,  and  I  was  greatly  indebted  to  her. 

I  had  hoped,  by  this  time,  to  be  leaving  the  Valley  of 
the  Shadow  of  Death,  its  rock  heat  and  its  ever- roaring 

H 


114  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

torrent,  but  had  to  remain  in  it  for  a  month  longer, 
lying  on  my  back.  I  reached  Pu  on  the  4th  July,  and 
Mr  Pagell  did  not  arrive  until  the  25th  of  the  month  • 
so  that  for  three  weeks,  and  during  the  critical  period  of 
the  disease,  I  had  to  be  my  own  doctor,  and  almost  my 
own  sick-nurse.  Only  those  who  have  experienced  acute 
dysentery  can  know  how  dreadfully  trying  and  harassing 
it  is  ;  and  the  servants  of  the  heroic  Livingstone  have 
told  how,  in  the  later  stages  of  it,  he  could  do  nothing 
but  groan  day  and  night.  Then  the  ipecacuanha,  which 
I  had  to  take  in  enormous  doses  before  I  could  contrive 
to  turn  the  disease,  kept  me  in  a  state  of  the  greatest 
feebleness  and  sickness.  The  apricot-trees  afforded 
grateful  shade,  but  they  harboured  hosts  of  sand-flies, 
which  tormented  me  all  night,  while  swarms  of  the  com- 
mon black  fly  kept  me  from  sleeping  during  the  day. 
There  were  numbers  of  scorpions  under  the  stones  around, 
both  the  grey  scorpion  and  the  large  black  scorpion 
with  its  deadly  sting,  of  the  effects  of  which  Vambery 
has  given  such  a  painful  account.  Curiously,  too,  this 
was  the  only  place  in  the  Himaliya  where  I  ever  heard 
of  there  being  serpents;  but  long  serpents  there  were — 
six  feet  long — gliding  before  my  open  tent  at  night. 
This  was  no  dream  of  delirium,  for  one  was  killed  quite 
close  to  it  and  brought  to  me  for  examination  ;  and  a 
few  weeks  after,  Mr  Pagell  killed  another  in  his  veran- 
dah. I  was  far  too  ill  to  examine  whether  my  serpent 
had  poison-fangs  or  not,  and  was  fain  to  be  content  with 
an  assurance  that  the  people  of  Pu  were  not  afraid  of 
these  long  snakes  ;  but  the  Moravian  found  that  the  one 
he  killed  had  fangs,  and  at  all  events  it  was  not  pleasant, 
even  for  a  half-dead  man,  either  to  see  them  in  moon- 
light, or  hear  them  in  darkness,  gliding  about  his  tent. 
One  end  of  the  field  in  front  of  me  touched  on  a  small 
forest,  which  ran  up  a  steep  valley,  and  was  likely  to 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.        115 

harbour  wild  beasts.  The  position  was  lonely,  also,  for 
I  had  to  make  my  servants  camp  a  little  way  off,  on  the 
side  away  from  the  forest,  in  order  not  to  be  disturbed 
by  their  talking  and  disputing,  or  by  their  visitors;  and 
so,  weak  as  I  was,  they  were  barely  within  call  even  when 
awake.  But  I  was  much  disturbed  by  the  singing  and  howl- 
ing of  a  number  of  Chinese  Tartars  who  had  come  over  the 
border  on  a  pilgrimage  to  the  Lama  temple  in  Pu.  These 
pious  persons  were  silent  all  day  till  about  two  or  three 
in  the  afternoon,  when  they  commenced  their  infernal 
revels,  and  (with  the  aid  of  potent  liquor,  I  was  told) 
kept  up  their  singing  and  dancing  for  several  nights  till 
morning.  In  addition  to  all  this,  huge  savage  Tibetan 
dogs  used  to  come  down  the  mountain-sides  from  a 
Lama  nunnery  above,  and  prowl  round  my  tent,  or 
poke  into  it,  in  search  of  what  they  could  find  ;  and  the 
letting  them  loose  at  all  was  highly  improper  conduct 
on  the  part  of  the  virtuous  sisterhood.  One  splendid 
red  dog  came  down  regularly,  with  long  leaps,  which  I 
could  hear  distinctly  ;  and  I  had  quite  an  affection  for 
him,  until,  one  night,  I  was  awakened  from  an  uneasy 
slumber  by  finding  his  mouth  fumbling  at  my  throat,  in 
order  to  see  if  I  was  cold  enough  for  his  purposes.  This 
was  a  little  too  much,  so  I  told  Silas  to  watch  for  it  and 
pepper  it  with  small  shot  from  a  distance  ;  but,  either 
accidentally  0/  by  design,  he  shot  it  in  the  side  from 
close  quarters,  killing  it  on  the  spot,  its  life  issuing  out 
of  it  in  one  grand,  hoarse,  indignant  roar.  Possibly  it 
occurred  to  my  servant  that  the  small  shot  from  a  dis- 
tance might  be  a  rather  unsafe  proceeding.  As  if  these 
things  were  not  enough,  I  had  a  vistor  of  another  kind 
one  night,  who  puzzled  me  not  a  little  at  first.  I  was 
lying  awake,  exhausted  by  one  of  the  paroxysms  of  my 
illness,  when  a  large  strange-looking  figure  stepped  into 
the  moonlight  just   before   my  tent,  and   moved   about 


n6  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

there  with  the  unsteady  swaying  motion  of  a  drunken 
man,  and  with  its  back  towards  me.  My  first  idea  was 
that  this  was  one  of  the  Chinese  Tartars  encamped 
beside  the  temple,  who  had  come  in  his  sheepskin  coat 
to  treat  me  to  a  war-dance,  or  to  see  what  he  could  pick 
up  ;  and  so  I  let  my  hand  fall  noiselessly  over  the  side 
of  the  couch,  upon  the  box  which  held  my  revolver.  It 
was  only  natural  that  I  should  think  so,  because  it  is 
very  rarely  that  any  animal,  except  homo  sapiens,  moves 
erect  upon  its  hind  legs,  or,  I  may  add,  gets  drunk. 
But  still  there  was  something  not  human  in  the  move- 
ments of  this  creature,  and  when  it  began  slowly  to 
climb  up  one  of  the  apricot-trees  in  a  curious  fashion,  I 
could  not  help  exclaiming  aloud,  "  Good  heavens  !  what 
have  we  got  now?"  On  this  it  turned  round  its  long 
head  and  gave  a  ferocious  growl,  enabling  me  both  to 
see  and  hear  that  it  was  one  of  the  great  snow-bears 
which  infest  the  high  mountains,  but  seldom  enter,  and  only 
by  stealth,  the  villages.  I  thought  it  prudent  to  make  no 
more  remarks  ;  and  after  another  warning  growl,  evi- 
dently intended  to  intimate  that  it  was  not  going  to  be 
balked  of  its  supper,  the  bear  continued  up  the  tree,  and 
commenced  feasting  on  the  apricots.  As  may  be  sup- 
posed, I  watched  somewhat  anxiously  for  its  descent ; 
and  as  it  came  down  the  trunk,  the  thought  seemed  to 
strike  it  that  a  base  advantage  might  be  taken  of  its 
position,  for  it  halted  for  an  instant,  and  gave  another 
warning  growl.  It  repeated  this  manoeuvre  as  it  passed 
my  tent,  on  its  four  legs  this  time,  but  otherwise  took  no 
notice  of  me  ;  and  there  was  a  curious  sense  of  perilous 
wrong-doing  about  the  creature,  as  if  it  were  conscious 
that  the  temptation  of  the  apricots  had  led  it  into  a  place 
where  it  ought  not  to  have  been.  I  did  not  mention  this 
circumstance  to  Silas,  for  he  was  extremely  anxious  to  have 
a  shot  at  a  bear,  and  I  was  just  as  anxious  that  he  should 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEATH.         117 

not,  because  he  had  no  sufficient  qualification  for  such 
dangerous  sport,  and  to  have  wounded  a  bear  would 
only  have  resulted  in  its  killing  him,  and  perhaps  some 
more  of  us.  After  that,  however,  though  never  troubled 
with  another  visit  of  the  kind,  I  had  a  sort  of  barricade 
made  at  night  with  my  table  and  other  articles  in  front 
of  the  tent,  so  that  I  might  not  be  taken  unawares  ;  for 
my  visitor  was  not  a  little  Indian  black  bear,  or  even  an 
ordinary  Tibetan  bear,  but  a  formidable  specimen  of  the 
yellow  or  snow  bear  (Urstts  Isabellinus),  which  usually 
keeps  above  the  snow-line,  is  highly  carnivorous  in  its 
habits,  and  often  kills  the  yaks  of  Pu,  and  of  other  vil- 
lages, when  they  are  sent  to  graze  in  summer  upon  the 
high  alp.  Shortly  after  this  I  discovered  that  the  way 
to  deal  with  the  horrible  irritation  of  the  sand-flies  was  to 
have  my  tent  closed  at  night,  and  to  smoke  them  out  of  it 
with  burning  fagots,  which  almost  entirely  freed  me  from 
their  annoyance,  and  was  an  immense  relief,  though  the 
plan  had  some  disadvantages  of  its  own,  because  I  did 
not  like  to  strike  a  light  for  fear  of  attracting  the  sand- 
flies ;  and  so  the  moving  of  creatures  about  and  inside 
my  tent  became  doubly  unpleasant  when  there  was  little 
or  no  moon,  for  in  the  darkness  I  could  not  tell  what 
they  might  be. 

It  was  in  this  way  that  I  spent  the  month  of  July, 
when  I  had  hoped  to  be  travelling  in  Chinese  Tibet. 
Trying  as  this  combination  of  horrors  was,  I  think  it  did 
me  good  rather  than  harm,  for  it  made  life  more  desir- 
able than  it  might  otherwise  have  appeared,  and  so  pre- 
vented me  succumbing  to  the  disease  which  had  got  all 
but  a  fatal  hold  of  me.  Moreover,  the  one  visitor  neu- 
tralised the  effect  of  the  other :  you  cease  to  care  about 
scorpions  when  you  see  long  snakes  moving  about  you 
at  night,  and  Tibetan  mastiffs  are  insignificant  after  the 
visit  of  an  Ursus  Isabellinus.     During  this  trying  period 


n8  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Mrs  Pagell  paid  me  a  short  visit  every  day  or  two,  and 
did  all  in  her  power  to  afford  medical  comforts.  My 
servants  also  were  anxious  to  do  all  they  could,  but 
they  did  not  know  what  to  do ;  and  I  was  scarcely  able 
to  direct  them  to  do  more  than  weigh  out  medicines  and 
to  leave  me  as  undisturbed  as  possible,  complete  repose 
being  almost  essential  to  recovery.  I  could  only  lie 
there,  remembering  the  lines — 

"  So  he  bent  not  a  muscle,  but  hung  there, 

As,  caught  in  his  pangs 
And  waiting  his  change,  the  king-serpent 

All  heavily  hangs, 
Far  away  from  his  kind,  in  the  pine, 

Till  deliverance  come." 

After  I  had  recovered,  and  we  were  away  from  Pi5, 
Mr  Pagell  told  me,  with  a  slightly  humorous  twinkle  in 
his  eye,  and  being  guilty  of  a  little  conjugal  infidelity, 
that  one  great  cause  of  his  wife's  anxiety  on  my  account 
was  that  she  did  not  know  where  I  was  to  be  buried,  or 
how  a  coffin  was  to  be  made  for  me.  About  the  ioth 
and  1 2th  of  July  it  looked  very  like  as  if  the  time  had 
come  for  arrangements  of  that  kind  being  made;  and 
poor  Mrs  Pagell  was,  naturally  enough,  greatly  at  a  loss 
what  to  do  in  the  absence  of  her  husband.  Ground  is 
very  valuable  at  Pu,  and  difficult  to  be  had,  being  en- 
tirely artificial,  and  terraced  up  on  the  mountain-side. 
For  a  stranger  to  occupy  any  portion  of  it  in  perpetuity 
would  have  been  a  serious  and  expensive  matter  ;  and 
Moravian  feeling  revolted  at  the  idea  of  growing  vege- 
tables or  buckwheat  over  my  grave.  Then,  as  every- 
thing should  be  done  decently  and  in  order,  the  ques- 
tion as  to  a  coffin  was  very  perplexing.  Had  the  prac- 
tical missionary  himself  been  there,  he  could  at  least 
have  supervised  the  construction  of  one  by  the  Pu  car- 
penters; but  his  wife  felt  quite  unequal  to  that,  and  was 


VALLEY  OF  THE  SHADOW  OF  DEA  TH.         119 

much  distressed  in  consequence.  Had  I  known  of  this 
anxiety,  I  could  have  put  her  mind  at  rest,  because  it 
never  occurred  to  me  that,  in  the  circumstances,  the  re- 
sponsibility of  making  arrangements  would  fall  upon 
any  one  except  myself.  Death  never  appeared  to  my- 
self so  near  as  the  people  beside  me  believed  it  to  be ; 
and  my  determination  was,  if  it  became  inevitable,  to 
make  arrangements  to  have  my  body  carried  up,  with- 
out a  coffin,  high  up  the  mountains  above  the  snow-line. 
I  had  fully  considered  how  this  could  have  been  ensured, 
and  have  always  had  a  fancy,  nay,  something  more  than 
a  fancy,  to  be  so  disposed  of,  far  away  from  men  and 
their  ways.  There  are  wishes  of  this  kind  which,  I  be- 
lieve, have  a  real  relationship  to  the  future,  though  the 
connection  may  be  too  subtile  to  be  clearly  traced. 
There  is  a  twofold  idea  in  death,  by  virtue  of  which  man 
still  attaches  himself  to  the  earth  while  his  spirit  may 
look  forward  to  brighter  worlds;  and  for  me  it  was  a  real 
consolation  to  think  of  myself  resting  up  there  among 
the  high  peaks — 

"  There,  watched  by  silence  and  by  night, 
And  folded  in  the  strong  embrace 
Of  the  great  mountains,  with  the  light 
Of  the  sweet  heavens  upon  nvy  face." 

But  it  had  not  come  to  that.  By  day  I  watched  the 
sunbeams  slanting  through  the  apricot-trees,  or  looked 
up  longingly  to  the  green  slopes  and  white  snows  of  the 
"  Windy  Peak  "  of  Gerard's  map.  Eve  after  eve  I  saw 
the  sunlight  receding  up  the  wild  precipices  and  fading 
on  the  snowy  summits.  Night  after  night  the  most 
baleful  of  the  constellations  drew  its  horrid  length- 
across  a  space  of  open  sky  between  the  trees,  and  its  red 
star,  Cor  Scorpii,  glared  down  upon  my  sick-bed  like  a 
malignant  eye  in  heaven.      And  while  the  crash  of  fall- 


120  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

ing  rocks  and  the  movements  of  stealthy  wild  creatures 
were  occasionally  heard,  night  and  day  there  ever  rose 
from  beneath  the  dull  thunderous  sound  of  the  Sutiej, 
to  remind  me,  if  that  were  needed,  that  I  was  still  in  the 
Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Death. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

CHINESE     T  A  R*T  A  R  S. 

JUST  after  I  had  managed  to  get  the  better  of  my  ill- 
ness, but  was  still  in  danger  from  it,  and  confined  to  my 
cot,  Mr  Pagell  arrived,  having  been  recalled  from  a  place 
in  Spiti,  ten  days'  journey  off,  by  the  letter  which  his 
wife  forwarded  to  him.  I  found  the  Moravian  mis- 
sionary to  be  a  strong,  active,  and  cheerful  man  ;  no 
great  scholar,  perhaps,  but  with  a  considerable  know- 
ledge of  English,  able  to  speak  Tibetan  fluently,  ac- 
quainted with  the  Lama  religion,  well  liked  by  the 
people  of  the  country,  and  versed  in  the  arts  which  were 
so  necessary  for  a  man  in  his  isolated  and  trying  posi- 
tion. He  had  been  established,  with  Mrs  Pagell,  at  Pii 
for  about  ten  years  ;  and,  before  that,  had  spent  some 
years  in  the  Moravian  mission  at  Kaelang  in  Lahaul, 
where  also  Tibetan  is  spoken.  The  house  he  had  con- 
structed for  himself,  or,  at  least,  had  supervised  the  con- 
struction of,  was  small,  but  it  was  strongly  built,  the 
thick  beams  having  been  brought  from  a  distance,  and 
was  well  fitted  to  keep  out  the  cold  of  winter,  though 
not  so  agreeable  as  a  summer  residence.  There  was  a 
small  chapel  in  his  compound,  in  which  service  was  con- 
ducted on  Sundays  for  the  benefit  of  the  few  Christians, 
and  of  any  strangers  or  people  of  the  place  who  might 
choose  to  attend.  Christianity  has  not  made  much  pro- 
gress at  Pu,  but  this  is  to  be  attributed  to  the  entire 
contentment  of  the  people  with  their  own  religion, 
rather  than  to  any  want  of  zeal  or  ability  on  the  part 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


of  the  missionary.  Besides  himself  and  his  wife,  two  or 
three  men,  with  their  families,  constituted  the  entire 
Christian  community  ;  and  of  these  one  was  the  here- 
ditary executioner  of  Kunawar,  the  office  having  been 
abolished  during  the  lifetime  of  his  father;  while  of 
another,  a  true  Tibetan,  who  acted  as  a  house  servant, 
Mrs  Pagell  said  that  he  was  a  schande,  or  scandal,  to  the 
Christian  name,  from  his  habits  of  begging  and  borrow- 
ing money  right  and  left.  The  good  lady's  opinion  of 
the  people  among  whom  she  dwelt,  whether  Christians 
or  Biidhists,  was  lower  than  that  of  her  husband ;  and, 
in  particular,  she  accused  them  of  being  very  ungrateful. 
I  saw  a  little  to  show  me  that  they  were  so — and  even 
Mr  Pagell  admitted  that;  but,  as  a  rule,  he  was  inclined 
to  take  their  part,  to  regard  them  in  a  kindly  manner, 
and  to  find  excuses  for  their  faults — even  for  their  poly- 
andry— in  the  circumstances  of  their  life.  A  youth, 
christened  Benjamin,  who  accompanied  us  for  some  days 
on  our  further  journey,  seemed  the  best  of  the  Chris- 
tians, and  I  think  he  was  glad  to  get  away  for  a  time 
in  order  to  escape  from  the  hateful  practice  which  Mrs 
Pagell  compelled  him  to  undergo,  of  washing  his  hands 
and  face  every  morning.  In  language,  dress,  religion, 
and  manners,  the  people  are  thoroughly  Tibetan  ;  and 
though  they  are  nominally  subject  to  the  Rajah  of 
Bussahir,  yet  their  village  is  so  difficult  of  access  that 
they  pay  little  regard  to  his  commands.  Mr  Pagell 
estimated  the  population  at  about  600,  but  I  should 
have  thought  there  were  more,  and  perhaps  he  meant 
families.  There  is  so  much  cultivation  at  Pii  that  the 
place  must  be  tolerably  wealthy.  During  my  stay 
there,  most  of  the  men  were  away  trading  in  Chinese 
Tibet  and  Ladak,  and  I  could  not  but  admire  the  won- 
derful industry  of  the  women.  There  were  some  fields 
before  my  tent  in  which  they  worked  literally  day  and 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  123 

night,  in  order  to  lose  no  time  in  getting  the  grain  cut, 
and  in  preparing  the  ground  for  a  second  crop,  one  of 
buckwheat.  Besides  labouring  at  this  the  whole  day, 
they  returned  to  their  fields  after  dinner  in  the  evening, 
and  worked  there,  with  the  aid  of  torches  of  resinous 
pine-wood,  until  one  or  two  in  the  morning.  The  enor- 
mous flocks  of  blue  pigeons  must  have  caused  great  loss 
in  the  grain  harvest.  There  are  vines  at  Pu,  and  very 
good  tobacco,  but  when  prepared  for  smoking  it  is  not 
properly  dried,  and  remains  of  a  green  colour.  I  found 
■  that  this  tobacco  when  well  sieved,  so  as  to  free  it  from 
the  dust  and  pieces  of  stalk,  afforded  capital  smoking 
material,  and  I  prefer  it  to  Turkish  tobacco. 

Mr  Pagell's  society  assisted  me  in  recovery,  and  I  was 
soon  able  to  sit  up  during  the  day  in  front  of  my  tent 
in  an  easy-chair,  with  which  he  furnished  me ;  and  on 
the  30th  of  July  I  was  able  to  visit  his  house.  But  I 
knew  that  my  recovery  would  go  on  much  more  rapidly 
if  I  could  get  up  to  some  of  the  heights  above  the  Sutlej 
valley.  Though  Pu  is  about  10,000  feet  high,  it  is  in 
the  Sutlej  valley,  and  has  not  a  very  healthy  climate 
in  August,  so  I  was  anxious  to  leave  it  as  soon  as  at 
all  possible.  Seeing  my  weak  state,  Mr  Pagell  kindly 
offered  to  accompany  me  for  a  few  days,  and  I  was  glad 
to  have  his  companionship.  On  the  afternoon  of  the 
5th  August  we  set  off  for  Shipki,  in  Chinese  Tibet,  with 
the  design  of  reaching  it  in  four  easy  stages.  Three 
hours  and  a  half  took  us  to  our  first  camping-place,  on 
some  level  ground  beyond  Dabling,  and  underneath  the 
village  of  Dubling — places  the  names  of  which  have  been 
transposed  by  the  Trigonometrical  Survey.  To  reach 
this,  we  had  to  descend  from  Pu  to  the  Sutlej,  and  cross 
that  river  upon  a  sangpa,  or  very  peculiar  kind  of 
wooden  bridge.  The  Sutlej  itself  is  here  known  to  the 
Tibetans    usually    by    the    name    of    Sangpo,   or    "  the 


124  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

river  ; "  and  I  notice  that  travellers  and  map-makers  are 
apt  to  get  confused  about  these  words,  sometimes  setting 
down  a  bridge  as  "  the  Sangpa  bridge,"  and  a  river  as 
"  the  Sangpo  river."  I  have  called  the  Namtii  bridge, 
as  it  is  named,  beneath  Pii  peculiar;  because,  though 
about  80  feet  above  the  stream,  which  is  there  over  100 
feet  across,  it  is  only  about  three  or  four  feet  broad  in 
the  middle,  is  very  shaky,  and  has  no  railing  of  any  kind 
to  prevent  one  going  over  it,  and  being  lost  in  the  foam- 
ing torrent  below.  A  Pui  yak  once  survived  a  fall  from 
this  bridge,  being  swept  into  a  backwater  there  is  a  little 
way  down  the  stream ;  but  that  was  a  mere  chance,  and 
the  Bos  grunniens  can  stand  a  great  deal  of  knocking 
about.  These  bridges  are  constructed  by  large  strong 
beams  being  pushed  over  one  another,  from  both  sides, 
until  they  approach  sufficiently  to  allow  of  the  topmost 
beams  being  connected  by  long  planks.  So  rapid  is  the 
river  below  this  bridge  that  Gerard  was  unable  to  fathom 
it  with  a  10-lb.  lead.  The  path  from  it  towards  the 
Chinese  frontier  kept  up  the  left  bank  of  the  Sutlej,  and 
not  far  above  it,  over  tolerably  level  ground.  The  pieces 
of  rock  in  the  way  were  unpleasant  for  dandy-travelling; 
but  it  would  take  little  labour  to  make  a  good  road  from 
beneath  Pu  to  opposite  the  junction  of  the  Sutlej  and 
the  Spiti  river,  there  being  a  kind  of  broad  ledge  all  the 
way  along  the  left  bank  of  the  former  stream,  but,  for 
the  most  part,  a  few  hundred  feet  above  it.  Though 
easier  for  travelling,  yet  the  Sutlej  valley  became  wilder 
than  ever  as  we  advanced  up  it,  though  not  so  chaotic 
as  lower  down.  On  the  side  opposite  to  us  there  were 
almost  perpendicular  precipices  thousands  of  feet  in 
height,  and  the  clay  and  mica-schist  strata  (interspersed 
here  and  there  with  granite)  were  twisted  in  the  most 
grotesque  manner.  Shortly  before,  a  Pii  hunter  had 
been  killed  by  falling  over  these  cliffs  when  in  search  of 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  125 

ibex.     Above  this  precipice-wall  high  peaks  were  occa- 
sionally visible,  but  in  our  neighbourhood  there  was  no- 
thing but  rocks  and  precipices,  the  foaming  river,  moun- 
tain torrents  crossing  the  path,  and  a  few  edible  pines 
junipers,  and  tufts  of  fragrant  thyme. 

On  the  next  day  to  Khalb,  a  short  journey  of  four 
hours,  the  Sutlej  gorge  appeared  still  deeper  and  nar- 
rower. Quartz-rock  became  more  plentiful,  and,  curi- 
ously enough,  we  passed  a  vein  of  very  soft  limestone. 
Some  of  the  mountain  streams  were  rather  difficult  to 
pass,  and  one  of  them  had  to  be  crossed  on  two  poles 
thrown  over  it,  though  to  have  fallen  into  the  torrent 
would  have  been  utter  destruction.  At  Khalb  there  is 
a  most  picturesque  camping-ground,  amid  huge  granite 
boulders,  and  well  shaded  by  pines  and  junipers.  It  is 
opposite  and  immediately  above  one  of  the  most  extra- 
ordinary scenes  in  the  world — the  junction  of  the  Sutlej, 
and  the  Lee  or  Spiti  river.  You  cannot  get  near  the 
junction  at  all,  and  there  are  few  points  from  which  you 
can  even  see  it,  so  deeply  is  it  sunk  between  close  mural 
precipices  ;  but  you  can  look  down  towards  it  and  see 
that  the  junction  must  be  there.  These  two  rivers  have 
all  the  appearance  of  having  cut  their  way  down  through 
hundreds  of  feet  of  solid  rock  strata.  Even  below  the 
great  precipices  they  seem  to  have  eaten  down  their  way 
and  made  deep  chasms.  I  do  not  venture  to  say  posi- 
tively that  such  has  been  the  case  ;  but  the  phenomena 
presented  are  well  worthy  of  the  special  attention  of 
geologists  ;  because,  if  these  rivers  have  cut  the  passages 
which  they  appear  to  have  cut,  then  a  good  deal  more 
effect  may  be  reasonably  ascribed  than  is  usually 
allowed  to  the  action  of  water  in  giving  the  surface  of 
our  globe  its  present  shape.  But,  though  not  positive, 
I  am  inclined  to  believe  that  the  Lee  and  the  Sutlej 
have  cut  a  perpendicular  gorge  for  themselves  from  a 


126  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

little  below  Khalb  down  to  the  present  level  of  their 
waters — a  distance,  roughly  speaking,  of  about  I2CO 
feet,  and  this  becomes  more  credible  on  considering  the 
structure  of  the  rock.  Gerard  fell  into  the  mistake 
(pardonable  in  his  day)  of  calling  it  "  stratified  granite." 
Across  the  Chinese  border  the  mountains  are  rolling 
plains  of  quartz  and  whitish  granite,  and  probably  con- 
tain great  gold  deposits  ;  but  at  the  confluence  of  the 
Spiti  river  and  the  Sutlej,  the  rock  is  slate  and  schist 
strata  containing  veins  and  detached  blocks  of  granite 
and  quartz,  and  also  various  zeolites.  These  slates  and 
schists  are  for  the  most  part  rather  soft,  and  the  whole 
strata  have  been  so  much  disturbed  by  the  process  of 
elevation  that  they  are  peculiarly  open  to  the  action  of 
disintegrating  influences.  The  weather  has  broken  it 
down  greatly  wherever  there  is  an  exposed  surface,  and 
extremely  rapid  rivers  might  eat  their  way  down  into  it 
with  considerable  ease.  Even  the  veins  and  blocks  of 
solid  granite  and  quartz  which  are  interspersed  among 
the  strata,  are  calculated  to  aid  rather  than  to  hinder 
such  a  process.  Though  the  Himaliya  are  at  once  the 
highest  and  the  most  extensive  mountains  in  the  world, 
yet  there  is  some  reason  to  believe  that  they  are  among 
the  youngest  ;  and  this  explains  the  present  state  of 
their  narrow  deep  valleys.  Their  rivers  carry  out  from 
them  an  immense  amount  of  solid  matter  every  year, 
but  the  process  has  not  continued  long  enough  to  allow 
of  the  formation  of  broad  valleys.  Hence  we  have  little 
more  in  the  Himaliya  than  immense  ravines  or  gorges. 
A  valley  there  is  something  like  the  interior  of  the 
letter  V,  only  the  farther  down  you  go,  the  more  nearly 
perpendicular  are  its  sides,  while  above  12,000  feet  there 
is  some  chance  of  finding  open,  rounded,  grassy  slopes. 
There  are  also  some  comparatively  open  or  fiat  valleys 
to  be  found  above  12,000  feet;  for  at  that  height,  where 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  127 

everything  is  frozen  up  during  great  part  of  the  year, 
there  are  no  large  rivers,  and  no  great  action  of  water  in 
any  way. 

At  this  junction  of  the  two  rivers  there  is  an  outstand- 
ing end  of  rock  wall,  which  is  pretty  sure  in  course  of 
time  to  cause  a  cataclysm  similar  to  what  occurred  on 
the  Sutlej  in  the  year  1762  below  Kunawar  province, 
when  a  shoulder  of  a  mountain  gave  way  and  fell  into 
the  gorge,  damming  up  the  stream  to  a  height  of  400  feet 
above  its  normal  level.  Similar  events  have  occurred  in 
the  upper  Indus  valley,  but  these  were  caused  by  aval- 
anches of  snow  or  ice.  In  the  case  to  which  I  allude, 
and  as  will  be  the  case  at  the  junction  of  the  Lee  and 
Sutlej,  the  fall  of  a  portion  of  the  mountain  itself  caused 
the  cataclysm ;  and  when  the  obstruction  gave  way, 
which  it  did  suddenly,  villages  and  towns  were  de- 
stroyed by  the  tremendous  rush  of  water.  The  Lee  is 
almost  as  inaccessible  and  furious  as  the  Sutlej,  but  it 
has  calm  pools,  and  its  water  is  of  a  pleasant  greenish 
hue,  which  contrasts  favourably  with  the  turbid,  whitish- 
yellow  of  the  latter  stream.  I  may  mention  that  I  have 
written  of  the  Spiti  river  as  the  Lee,  or  Li,  because  it 
has  got  by  that  name  into  the  maps ;  but  it  is  not  so 
called  by  the  people  of  the  country,  and  the  name  has 
probably  arisen  from  a  confused  localising  of  it  with  the 
village  of  Li  or  L10,  which  is  to  be  found  a  short  way 
above  the  confluence.  On  both  sides  of  the  Chinese 
border  they  call  the  Spiti  river  the  Mapzja  JzazJiolmo. 
The  former  of  these  words  means  a  peacock,  but  what 
the  connection  is  I  do  not  know.  It  must  be  admitted, 
however,  that  Mapzja  Jzazholmo  are  not  sounds  well 
fitted  to  make  their  way  with  the  general  public,  so  I 
shall  continue  to  speak  of  the  Lee  or  Spiti  river.  I  may 
aiso  be  excused  from  calling  the  Sutlej  the  LangcJihcn- 
khabad,  or  "elephant-mouth-fed"  river,  which  General 


128  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Cunningham  asserts  is  the  Tibetan  name  for  the  Sutlej; 
though  all  the  Tibetans  I  questioned  on  the  subject 
spoke  of  it  either  as  the  Sangpo,  or  as  the  Singf  Sangpo. 
In  fact,  there  seem  to  be  numerous  local  names  for  the 
rivers  in  that  part  of  the  world,  and  it  would  be  hazard- 
ous to  insist  on  any  one  in  particular. 

From  Khalb  there  are  two  ways  of  getting  to  Shipki  ; 
the  one  over  the  Kung-ma  Pass,  which  is  16,000  feet 
high,  and  the  other  up  the  gorge  of  the  Sutlej,  across 
the  face  of  its  precipitous  cliffs,  and  over  the  dreaded 
Oopsung  Gorge.  The  latter  road  is  never  used  when 
the  snow  will  at  all  allow  of  the  high  pass  being  crossed  ; 
and — judging  from  what  I  saw  of  it  afterwards,  from  the 
mountain  Lfo  Porgyul  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  river 
—  it  must  be  nearly  as  bad  as  the  path  from  Shaso  to  Pu. 
The  cliffs,  however,  on  which  the  path  runs  must  be 
interesting  to  the  geologist.  They  are  often  of  a  bluish 
and  of  a  purple  colour  ;  they  present  a  brilliant  and 
dazzling  appearance  from  the  zeolites  with  which  they 
abound,  and  probably  have  other  and  rarer  minerals. 
But  the  Kung-ma  Pass,  above  the  height  of  Mont  Blanc 
though  it  be,  is  the  only  tolerable  way  of  crossing  into 
Chinese  Tibet  from  Pii  ;  and  to  toil  over  a  16,000  feet 
pass  in  one  day  is  not  desirable  for  an  invalid,  even, 
though  starting  from  a  height  of  about  io;ooo  feet.  So, 
after  procuring  yaks  and  coolies,  for  the  passage  into 
Tartary,  from  the  villages  of  Khalb  and  Namgea,  we 
resolved  to  camp  some  way  up  on  the  pass,  and  to  take 
two  days  to  the  business.  This  can  easily  be  done,  be- 
cause at  the  height  of  about  12,500  feet  there  are  a  few 
terraced  fields  belonging  to  Namgea,  and  called  Namgea 
Rizhing,  with  sufficient  room  to  pitch  a  small  tent  upon, 
and  with  plenty  of  water  and  bushes  fit  for  firewood. 

At  this  height  the  air  was  very  pure  and  exhilarating, 
but  the  sun  beat  upon  our  tents  in  the  afternoon  so  as 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  129 

to  raise  the  thermometer  within  them  to  820  Fahrenheit ; 
but  almost  immediately  after  the  sun  sank  behind  the 
Spiti  mountains,  the  thermometer  fell  to  6o°.  I  do  not 
think  it  got  much  lower,  however,  for  at  daybreak  it 
was  540.  Evening  brought  also  a  perfect  calm,  which 
was  most  welcome  after  the  violent  wind  of  the  day; 
but  the  wind  rose  again  during  the  night,  which  for- 
tunately does  not  usually  happen  in  the  Hiinaliva, 
otherwise  existence  there  in  tents  would  be  almost  in- 
supportable. From  the  little  shelf  on  which  we  camped, 
as  also,  to  some  extent,  from  Khalb  and  Namgea  be- 
neath, the  view  was  savage  and  grand  beyond  descrip- 
tion. There  was  a  mountain  before  us,  visible  in  all  its 
terrific  majesty.  The  view  up  the  Spiti  valley  had  a 
wild  beauty  of  its  own,  and  ended  in  blue  peaks,  at  this 
season  nearly  free  from  snow  ;  but  the  surprising  scene 
before  us  was  on  the  left  bank  of  the  Spiti  river,  and 
on  the  right  of  the  Sutlej,  or  that  opposite  to  which  we 
were.  A  mountain  rose  there  almost  sheer  up  from  the 
Sutlej.  or  from  9000  feet  to  the  height  of  22,183  feet,  in 
gigantic  walls,  towers,  and  aiguilles  cf  cream-coloured 
granite  and  quartz,  which  had  all  the  appearance  of 
marble.  At  various  places  a  stone  might  have  rolled 
from  the  summit  of  it  down  into  the  river,  a  descent  of 
over  13,000  feet.  In  appearance  it  was  something  like 
Milan  Cathedral  divested  of  its  loftiest  spire,  and 
magnified  many  million  times,  until  it  reached  the 
height  of  12,000  feet  ;  and  I  either  noticed  or  heard 
several  great  falls  of  rock  down  its  precipitous  sides, 
during  the  eight  days  I  was  on  it  or  in  its  immediate 
neighbourhood.  Here  and  there  the  white  rock  was 
streaked  with  snow,  and  it  was  capped  by  an  enormous 
citadel  with  small  beds  of 'neve;  but  there  was  very  little 
snow  upon  the  gigantic  mass  of  rock,  because  the  furi- 
ous winds  which  for  ever  beat  and  howl  around  it  allow 

1 


130  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

but  little  snow  to  find  a  resting-place  there.  At  Shipki 
they  told  us  that  even  in  winter  Lio  Porgyul, -as  this 
mountain  is  called,  presents  much  the  same  appearance 
as  it  had  when  we  saw  it.  Half  of  it  rests  on  Chinese 
Tartary,  and  the  other  half  on  Hangrang,  a  province 
which  was  ceded  by  the  Chinese  less  than  a  century 
ago  to  the  Rajah  of  Bussahir ;  so  that  Lio  Porgyul 
might  well  be  regarded  as  a  great  fortress  between  Iran 
and  Turan,  between  the  dominions  of  the  Aryan  and 
the  Tartar  race.  Even  more  remarkably  than  the 
Kailas,  it  suggested  an  inaccessible  dwelling-place  of 
the  gods,  a  fortress  shaped  by  hands,  but  not  by  human 
hands.  And  if  the  scene  was  impressive  by  day,  it  was 
absolutely  overpowering  at  night,  when  the  orb  of  night 
was  slowly  rising  behind  the  dark  precipices  on  which 
we  midway  stood.  While  itself  unseen,  the  moon's 
white  light  illuminated  the  deep  gorges  of  the  Spiti 
river,  and  threw  a  silvery  splendour  on  the  marble-like 
towers  and  battlements  of  Lio  Porgyul.  It  did  not  at 
all  appear  as  if  any  external  light  were  falling,  but 
rather  as  if  this  great  castle  of  the  gods,  being  trans- 
parent as  alabaster,  were  lighted  up  from  within,  and 
shone  in  its  own  radiance,  throwing  its  supernatural 
light  on  the  savage  scenes  around. 

The  word  ma  in  Chinese  means  a  horse,  and  it  is  pos- 
sible that  the  Kung-ma  may  mean  the  Horse  Pass,  in 
contradistinction  to  the  path  across  the  cliffs  of  the 
Sutlej,  along  which  horses  cannot  go  ;  but  I  am  by  no 
means  sure  of  this  derivation.  Be  that  as  it  may,  horses 
or  some  animals  are  needed  on  the  stiff  pull  up  to  the 
top  of  it  in  a  highly  rarefied  air.  Here  we  found  the 
immense  advantage  of  our  yaks,  and  "the  comfort"  of 
riding  upon  them.  They  grunted  at  almost  every  step, 
and  moved  slowly  enough,  but  on  they  went  steadily, 
seldom  stopping  to  rest.     Chota    Khan,    who   had  not 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  131 

been  provided  with  a  yak,  was  extremely  indignant  at 
the  exertion  which  his  large  body  had  to  make,  and  I 
regretted  not  having  been  more  liberal  towards  him. 
As  we  got  np  towards  the  16,000  feet  summit,  the  effect 
of  the  rarefied  air  compelled  him  to  pause  at  every  step, 
and  quite  bewildered  him.  He  and  one  or  two  other 
of  our  people,  also,  began  bleeding  at  the  nose.  These 
phenomena,  together  with  the  novel  sight  of  a  glacier 
hanging  above  us  near  the  top  of  the  pass,  had  such  an 
effect  upon  the  bold  Afghan,  that,  at  one  point,  he  sat 
down  and  cried,  lamenting  his  fate,  and  cursing  every- 
body and  everything  in  general,  the  word  Sheitan,  or 
"  devil,"  being  especially  conspicuous  in  his  language. 
That  was  only  a  momentary  weakness,  however  ;  for  on 
getting  down  the  Chinese  side  of  the  pass  he  quite  re- 
covered his  spirits;  he  went  down  rollicking  and  sing- 
ing, and  was  the  first  to  enter  the  dreaded  Shipki,  where 
some  Tartar  young  women  speedily  brought  him  to  his 
bearings  and  threw  him  into  a  state  of  great  perplexity. 
It  took  us  nearly  ten  hours  to  reach  Shipki  from 
Namgea  Fields,  and  we  started  at  four  in  the  morning 
in  order  to  escape  the  full  effect  of  the  sun's  rays  when 
ascending  the  pass,  which  involved  no  rock-climbing, 
but  a  continuous  and  very  steep  ascent  up  a  corkscrew 
path,  which  was  the  best  I  had  seen  since  leaving  Pan- 
gay.  Though  the  air,  generally  speaking,  is  quite  cool 
and  invigorating  at  these  great  elevations,  yet  the  re- 
flected and  radiating  rock-heat  is  sometimes  exceed- 
ingly oppressive  ;  and  so  powerful  are  the  rays  of  the 
sun  in  summer,  that  exposure  to  them,  or  even  to  a 
good  reflection  of  them,  will  destroy  the  skin  of  the 
hands  or  face  of  a  European  in  five  minutes,  or  even 
less.  We  were  all  a  little  ill  after  crossing  this  pass, 
and  I  ascribe  that  not  so  much  to  the  exertion  it  re- 
quired, or  to  the  rarefied  air,  as  to  the  tremendous  heat 


132  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

and  glare  of  the  sun  on  the  south-east  slope  down  to 
Shipki,  which  involves  rather  more  than  a  mile  of  per- 
pendicular descent. 

A  short  way  before  reaching  the  extreme  summit  of 
the  pass,  we  rested  for  a  little  on  an  open  brow  of  the 
mountain  covered  with  grass  and  flowers.  The  view 
over  the  Spiti  ranges  to  the  north-west  was  very  exten- 
sive and  striking  ;  for,  though  it  was  a  land  of  desola- 
tion on  which  we  gazed,  it  was  under  an  intensely 
dark-blue  sky  ;  it  was  beautifully  coloured  with  snow 
and  cloud,  and  variegated  rock,  and  presented  vast 
ranges  of  picturesquely  shaped  peaks,  between  two  of 
which  the  18,000  feet  Manerung  Pass  could  easily  be 
discerned.  Westward,  over  sections  of  the  Sutlej  valley, 
near  Ra rang  and  Pangay,  the  great  peaks  and  snows  of 
the  Indian  Kailas  mingled  with  the  clouds  of  the  Indian 
monsoon,  which  were  arrested  on  its  southern  side. 
Behind  us,  and  overhanging  us,  were  glaciers  and  snowy 
peaks.  Then  came  the  summit  of  the  Kung-ma  Pass, 
and  to  the  north-east  the  vast  citadel  of  Lio  Porgyul. 
Though  the  view  was  limited  on  one  side,  yet  it  was 
much  more  extensive  than  any  I  have  seen  from  any 
other  Himaliyan  pass, — even  from  the  Shinkal,  which  is 
at  least  20OO  feet  higher.  An  enormous  semicircle  was 
visible  of  grand  precipices,  high  mountain  peaks,  and 
snowy  summits  over  20,000  feet  high.  Resting  on  the 
grass,  looking  on  that  beautiful  yet  awful  scene — on  the 
boundless  wild  of  serrated  ridges,  rock-needles,  mountain 
battlements,  storm-scathed  precipices,  silvery  domes, 
icy  peaks,  and  snowy  spires — and  breathing  the  pure, 
keen,  exhilarating  air, — it  almost  seemed  as  if,  during 
my  illness  at  Pu,  I  had  indeed  passed  from  the  tortur- 
ing life  of  earth,  and  had  now  alighted  upon  a  more 
glorious  world.  But  the  Namgea  women  dispelled  the 
illusion  by  bringing  me  blue  Alpine  flowers,  reminding 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  133 

me  that  I  was  still  upon  the  sad  star,  the  loveliness 
of  which  is  marred  by  the  dark  shadow  which  hangs 
over  all  its  sentient  and  conscious  beings.  "  Our  life  is 
crowned  with  darkness;"  and  it  becomes  not  those  who 
aspire  to  be  worthy  of  that  crown  to  seek  it  prematurely, 
while  those  the  inclination  of  whose  natures  must  draw 
them  from  the  purgatory  of  earth  to  a  lower  and  darker 
world,  if  there  existence  is  to  be  continued  at  all,  in- 
stinctively cling  to  the  happiest  life  they  can  hope  to 
know.  But  even  earthly  life,  under  certain  conditions, 
has  its  intense  enjoyments.  It  was  an  immense  relief 
for  me,  after  the  Sutlej  valley  and  its  shadow  of  death, 
to  feel  my  feet  on  the  springy  turf  of  rounded  slopes — 
to  find  that  I  had  room  to  move  and  breathe — and  to 
see  the  lights  and  shadows  chasing  each  other  over  the 
flowery  grass. 

Before  the  last  ascent,  we  passed  beneath  a  consider- 
able glacier  into  a  small  but  deep  ravine,  just  above 
which  there  was  a  camping-place  for  travellers,  but  no 
wood  and  no  water  visible,  though  a  stream  from  the 
glacier  might  be  heard  moving  underneath  the  ground. 
This  camping-place  marks  the  boundary  between  Kuna- 
war  and  the  Chinese  territory ;  and  from  there  a  gentle 
ascent,  difficult  only  from  the  great  rarity  of  the  air,  took 
us  up  to  the  extreme  summit  of  the  Kungma  Pass,  where 
there  are  the  ruins  of  a  Tartar  guard-house,  at  which 
formerly  travellers  attempting  to  cross  the  Chinese 
frontier  used  to  be  stopped ;  but  as  a  European  tra- 
veller makes  his  appearance  at  this  gate  of  entrance 
only  once  in  ten  or  fifteen  years,  it  was  obviously  quite 
unnecessary  to  keep  a  permanent  guard  up  there  at  the 
inconvenient  height  of  i6,coofeet — and  so  the  congenial 
business  of  stopping  his  advance  has  been  deputed  to 
the  people  of  the  large  village  of  Shipki,  which  lies  im- 
mediately,   but    nearly  6000  feet  below.      Fortunately 


134  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

there  was  hardly  any  wind  ;  for  at  these  great  heights 
exposure  to  a  high  wind  for  a  few  minutes  may  be  fatal, 
so  rapidly  does  it  make  the  body  inanimate.  From  this 
guard -house  the  view  towards  Tartary  was  perfectly  un- 
clouded and  clear.  It  presented  to  our  view  a  great 
expanse  of  bare  and  rounded  but  smooth-looking  hills 
fading  away  into  the  elevated  rolling  plains  beyond. 
The  appearance  of  Tartary  is  quite  different  from  that 
of  Kunawar  and  Spiti,  and  of  the  Western  Himaliya  in 
general.  Except  down  at  Shipki,  not  a  tree  was  visible, 
and  there  were  no  high  peaks  or  abrupt  precipices.  No 
snow  was  visible  in  Tartary  beyond  Lfo  Porgyul,  though 
the  Shi'rang  mountain,  over  which  the  road  to  Gartop 
goes,  must  be  about  i8,ooo  feet  high.  The  furze  on 
these  mountain  plains  was  here  and  there  of  a  dark- 
brown  colour;  and  when  Alexander  Gerard,  a  native  of 
Aberdeenshire,  saw  it  from  a  neighbouring  pass  in  1818, 
he  was  at  once  struck  by  the  resemblance  of  the  furze 
to  Scotch  heather.  Even  "  Caledonia  stern  and  wild," 
however,  has  no  scenes  which  could  afford  any  notion  of 
the  wild  sterility  of  these  Tartar  plains,  or  of  the  tre- 
mendous mass  of  Lfo  Porgyul  which  flanked  them  on 
the  immediate  left.  There  is  no  descent  in  Scotland 
either  to  compare  in  utter  wearisomeness  to  that  of  the 
6coo  feet  from  the  top  of  the  Kung-ma  down  to  the 
great  village  of  Shipki.  though,  to  do  the  Chinese  justice, 
they  must  have  expended  not  a  little  labour  on  the  rude 
path  which  connects  the  two  points.  This  path  was  too 
steep  for  riding  down  comfortably  on  a  yak  ;  and  even 
Chota  Khan,  despite  his  bleeding  at  the  nose,  declined 
the  offer  which  I  made  him  of  the  use  of  mine.  So  I 
had  to  endure  more  than  the  usual  amount  of  bumping, 
in  my  dandy,  and  of  being  let  fall  suddenly  and  violently 
on  the  stony  ground,  owing  to  the  two  coolies  in  front 
occasionally  coming  down  by  the  run.     I  did,  however, 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  135 

manage  to  get  carried  down,  there  being  literally  no 
help  for  it ;  but  the  dandywallahs  came  to  Mr  Pagell 
next  day  and  pathetically  showed  that  gentleman  the 
state  of  their  shoulders. 

Chota  Khan  and  one  or  two  more  of  our  servants  had 
gone  on  in  advance  to  Shipki,  with  some  of  the  coolies( 
in  order  to  have  the  little  mountain  tents  ready  for  us 
on  our  arrival  ;  but  that  was  not  to  be  accomplished  so 
easily  as  they  expected.  Instead  of  tents,  a  most  amus- 
ing scene  presented  itself  when  we  at  last  got  down. 
But,  in  order  to  understand  it,  the  reader  must  bear  in 
mind  that  Shipki  is  situated  on  the  very  steep  slope  of  a 
hill  above  a  foaming  river,  and  that  it  is  by  no  means  a 
place  abundant  in  level  ground.  In  fact,  there  is  no 
level  ground  at  Shipki  except  the  roofs  of  the  houses, 
which  are  usually  on  a  level  with  the  streets,  and  the 
narrow  terraced  fields,  the  entrances  to  which  are 
guarded  by  prickly  hedges  or  stone  walls,  or  clievaux- 
de-frise  of  withered  gooseberry  branches.  You  cannot 
pitch  a  tent  on  a  slope,  covered  with  big  stones,  at  an 
angle  of  about  45 °.  Neither  were  the  roofs  of  the  houses 
desirable,  because  on  the  roof  of  every  house  there  was 
a  ferocious  Tibetan  mastiff,  roused  to  the  highest  pitch 
of  excitement  by  our  arrival,  and  desiring  nothing  better 
than  that  some  stranger  should  intrude  upon  his  domain. 
Consequently  the  terraced  fields  presented  the  only 
available  places  for  our  tents,  and  they  were  clearly 
available,  many  of  them  being  in  stubble,  while  there 
was  no  immediate  intention  of  digging  up  the  ground. 
Of  course  a  terraced  field  was  the  place,  but  here  was 
the  difficulty  which  threw  Chota  Khan  into  a  state  of 
amazement,  perplexity,  and  wrath.  A  band  of  hand- 
some and  very  powerful  young  Tartar  women — clad  in 
red  or  black  tunics,  loose  trousers,  and  immense  cloth 
boots,  into  which  a  child  of  five  years  old  might  easily 


136  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

have  been  stuffed — had  constituted  themselves  the 
guardians  of  these  terraced  fields,  and  whenever  Chota 
Khan  or  any  of  his  companions  attempted  to  enter,  they 
not  only  placed  their  bulky  persons  in  the  way,  but  even 
showed  determined  fight.  Woman  to  man,  I  believe 
these  guardian  angels  could  have  given  our  people  a 
sound  thrashing  ;  and  I  afterwards  found  it  to  be  a  most 
useful  goad  for  lagging  coolies  to  remark  that  one  Shipki 
woman  could  beat  two  men  of  Spiti  or  Lahaul,  as  the 
case  might  be.  These  angels  in  big  boots  were  very 
good-humoured,  and  seemed  to  enjoy  their  little  game 
immensely;  but  not  the  less  on  that  account  were  they 
pertinacious,  and  even  ferocious,  when  any  attempt  was 
made  to  get  past  them.  If  catching  a  Tartar  be  a  diffi- 
cult operation,  I  should  like  to  know  what  catching  a 
Tartar  young  woman  must  be.  When  we  arrived,  Mr 
Pagell  reasoned  with  them  eloquently  in  fluent  Tibetan, 
and  they  allowed  the  force  of  his  argument  to  the  extent 
of  admitting  that  there  was  no  spot  for  us  at  Shipki  on 
which  to  pitch  our  tents  except  a  terraced  field  ;  but 
they  parried  the  obvious  conclusion  by  reminding  him 
that  there  was  a  very  nice  little  piece  of  camping-ground 
about  half  way  up  the  six  thousand  feet  we  had  just 
come  down,  and  that  it  was  little  past  the  middle  of  the 
day.  I  myself  tried  gently  to  pass  between  them,  with 
the  most  admiring  smiles  and  affectionate  demeanour  I 
could  summon  up  for  the  occasion,  and  in  the  circum- 
stances ;  but  though  this  seemed  to  amuse  them  much, 
it  did  not  at  all  induce  them  to  allow  me  to  pass  ;  and 
when  we  tried  other  fields,  either  the  same  women  or  a 
fresh  band  opposed  our  entrance.  Meanwhile,  groups 
of  men,  on  the  roofs  of  houses  and  elsewhere,  watched 
the  operations  without  interfering.  It  really  looked  as 
if  the  intention  was  to  compel  us  to  go  back  from  Shipki 
without  allowing  us  to  stay  there   even    for   a   night. 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  137 

There  was  much  ingenuity  in  this  plan  of  setting  the 
Tartar  damsels  to  prevent  our  camping.  Had  we  used 
force  towards  these  young  persons,  there  would  have 
been  a  fair  reason  for  the  men  of  the  place  falling  upon 
us  in  a  murderous  manner;  and  Mr  M'Nab,  the  super- 
intendent of  the  hill  states,  had  told  me  that  one  of  his 
predecessors  in  office,  who  tried  either  to  camp  at  Shipki 
or  to  go  farther,  very  nearly  lost  his  life  there.  Had  I 
been  alone,  I  do  not  know  what  might  have  happened, 
for,  in  my  weak  state,  I  was  beginning  to  get  irritated  ; 
and  it  was  fortunate  I  was  accompanied  by  Mr  Pagell, 
who  took  the  matter  quite  easily,  and  said  it  would  be 
necessary  to  respect  the  wishes  of  the  people  of  the 
country.  Fortunately,  too,  at  this  juncture,  he  recog- 
nised a  Lama,  for  whom  he  had  formerly  done  some 
medical  service,  and  the  Lama  not  only  took  our  part 
generally,  but  also  offered  us  a  narrow  field  of  his  own 
on  which  to  pitch  our  tents.  There  was  a  disposition 
on  the  part  of  the  young  Tartars  to  resist  this  also,  but 
they  were  a  little  too  late  in  making  up  their  minds  to 
do  so ;  for  whenever  the  priest  showed  my  friend  the 
wall  which  was  at  the  end  of  his  field,  our  servants  and 
coolies,  appreciating  the  exigency  of  the  occasion,  made 
a  rush  over  it  and  took  immediate  possession. 

We  remained  at  Shipki  that  afternoon,  the  whole  of  the 
next  day,  and  the  greater  part  of  the  day  after,  making 
unavailing  attempts  to  provide  for  farther  progress  into 
Chinese  Tibet.  We  should  have  been  glad  to  go  very 
lightly  burdened,  but  none  of  the  coolies  or  yakmen 
from  Kunawar  would  accompany  us  a  step  farther. 
They  said  that  their  duty  to  their  own  State  had  com- 
pelled them  to  take  us  across  the  frontier  to  Shipki,  at 
great  inconvenience  to  themselves,  for  it  was  their  season 
of  harvest,  and  many  of  the  men  of  their  villages  were 
away  travelling  on  commercial  ventures  ;  but  that  there 


138  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

was  no  duty  resting  on  them  to  take  us  any  farther,  and 
they  were  afraid  to  do  so,  because  they  well  knew  that 
if  they  persisted  in  advancing  with  us,  the  Tartars  would 
either  fall  upon  them  and  kill  them  then,  or  do  so  on 
some  future  occasion  when  their  business  might  take 
them  across  the  frontier.  We  had  no  hold  upon  the 
Kunawar  people  for  a  farther  journey  ;  it  would  have 
been  most  cruel  and  unjustifiable  to  have  attempted  to 
force  them  to  accompany  us,  and  they  would  listen  to 
no  offers  of  increased  monetary  recompense.  The  Tar- 
tars, on  the  other  hand,  were  still  more  impracticable. 
They  openly  derided  the  idea  of  our  going  on  into  their 
country,  and  would  not  give  us  any  supplies  either  of 
carriage  or  of  food.  On  the  whole,  they  were  anything 
but  civil,  and  at  times  it  looked  as  if  they  only  wanted 
a  pretext  for  falling  upon  us  ;  but  at  other  times  they 
condescended  to  reason  on  the  matter.  They  said  that 
they  were  under  express  orders  from  the  Lassa  Govern- 
ment not  to  allow  any  Europeans  to  pass,  and  that  it 
would  be  as  much  as  their  possessions  and  their  heads 
were  worth  to  allow  us  to  do  so.  Death  itself  would  not 
be  the  worst  which  might  befall  them,  as  there  were 
certain  dreadful  modes  of  death,  which  I  shall  presently 
describe,  to  which  they  might  be  subjected.  On  my 
referring  to  the  Treaty  of  Tientsin,  which  gives  British 
subjects  a  right  to  travel  within  the  dominions  of  the 
Celestial  Emperor,  and  mentioning  that  I  had  travelled 
a  great  deal  in  China  itself,  they  first  said  that  they  had 
no  information  of  any  such  treaty  having  been  concluded; 
and  then  they  ingeniously  argued  that,  though  it  might 
allow  foreigners  to  travel  in  China  Proper,  yet  it  did  not 
apply  to  Tibet,  which  was  no  part  of  China,  and  only 
loosely  connected  with  that  country.  When  we  pressed 
them  for  the  reasons  of  this  exclusive  policy,  they 
answered    that  they  were  not  bound   to  give  reasons, 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  139 

having  simply  to  obey  orders  ;  but  that  one  obvious 
reason  was,  that  wherever  Englishmen  had  been  allowed 
entrance  into  a  country,  they  had  ended  in  making  a 
conquest  of  it.  We  had  landed  peaceably  on  the  coast 
of  India,  and  immediately  proceeded  to  conquer  the 
coast.  We  then  took  a  little  more  and  a  little  more, 
always  pretending,  in  the  first  instance,  to  be  peaceable 
travellers  and  merchants,  until  we  got  up  to  the  country 
of  Runjit  Singh,  and  the  next  thing  heard  there  was 
that  we  had  taken  Runjit  Singh's  dominions.  Now  we 
wanted  to  travel  in  the  country  of  the  Sacred  Religion 
(Lamaism) ;  'but  the  Tibetans  knew  better  than  that, 
and  that  the  only  safe  course  for  them,  if  they  wished 
to  preserve  their  country  to  themselves,  was  to  keep  us 
out  of  it  altogether.  On  this  we  remarked,  that  China 
had  brought  trouble  on  itself  by  attempting  to  exclude 
Europeans,  whereas  matters  had  gone  smoothly  after 
admitting  them,  and  referred  to  Japan  as  an  instance  of 
a  long-secluded  country  which  had  found  advantage  (I 
am  not  sure  very  much)  from  admitting  Europeans;  but 
they  seemed  to  interpret  this  as  a  threat,  and  replied 
boisterously,  that  they  might  as  well  be  killed  fighting 
us  as  be  killed  for  letting  us  pass — there  would  be  some 
amusement  in  that  ;  and  if  ever  war  came  upon  them, 
they  were  quite  willing  to  engage  in  war,  because,  having 
the  true  religion,  they  were  certain  to  conquer.  This 
argument  struck  the  Moravian  missionary  as  especially 
ridiculous,  and  in  another  way  it  might  have  done  so  to 
an  artillery  officer,  for  a  couple  of  mountain-guns  could 
easily  destroy  Shipki  from  the  Kung-ma  Pass;  but  it 
was  not  ridiculous  in  the  mouths  of  these  wild  Tartar 
mountaineers,  who  firmly  believe  in  their  extraordinary 
religion,  and  whose  only  experience  of  warfare  has  been 
matchlock-skirmishing  on  their  lofty  frontiers  with  the 
men  of  Kunawar,  for  whom  they  have  the  greatest  con- 
tempt. 


140  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

It  was  curious  to  find  these  rude  men  reasoning  thus 
ingeniously,  and  it  struck  me  forcibly  that  though  the 
voice  was  the  voice  of  the  rough  Tartar  Esau,  yet  the 
words  were  the  words  of  the  wily  Chinese  Jacob.  There 
was  something  peculiarly  Chinese-like  also,  and  far  from 
Tartar,  in  the  way  in  which  they  shirked  responsibility. 
Personally  they  were  not  at  all  afraid  of  being  uncivil  ; 
but  when  it  came  to  the  question  as  to  who  was  who, 
and  on  whose  responsibility  they  acted,  then  they  be- 
came as  evasive  as  possible.  Thus,  in  the  matter  of 
supplies,  though  they  at  first  refused  point-blank  to  let 
us  have  any,  yet,  after  a  little,  they  adopted  different 
and  still  more  unpleasant  tactics.  They  said  they  would 
let  us  have  a  sheep — a  small  one — for  five  rupees,  which 
was  about  double  its  value.  On  our  agreeing  to  give 
five,  no  sheep  appeared  ;  and  on  our  inquiring  after  it,  a 
message  was  sent  back  that  we  might  have  it  for  six 
rupees.  On  six  being  agreed  to,  the  price  was  raised 
to  seven,  and  so  on,  until  it  became  too  apparent  that 
they  were  only  amusing  themselves  with  us.  And  when- 
ever we  reasoned  on  this  subject  with  an  ugly  monster 
who  had  been  put  forward — and  had  put  himself  for- 
ward with  a  great  profession  of  desire  for  our  comfort — ■ 
as  the  official  corresponding  to  the  mukca  or  lambadar, 
who  looks  after  the  wants  of  travellers — he  promptly 
disclaimed  all  pretensions  to  having  anything  to  do  with 
such  a  function,  and  pointed  to  another  man  as  the  verit- 
able miikea,  to  whom  we  ought  to  apply.  This  other 
man  said  it  was  true  he  was  a  relative  of  that  func- 
tionary, and  he  would  be  happy  to  do  anything  for  us  if 
the  headmen  of  the  village  would  authorise  it,  but  the 
veritable  mukca  was  up  with  the  sheep  on  the  Kung-ma, 
and  if  we  found  him  there  on  our  way  back,  he  would, 
no  doubt,  supply  all  our  wants.  In  this  way  we  were 
bandied  about  from  pillar  to  post  without  getting  satis- 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  141 

faction,  or  finding  responsibility  acknowledged  anywhere. 
On  the  matter  being  pressed,  we  were  told  that  the 
headmen  of  Shipki  were  deliberating  upon  our  case  ; 
but  it  was  impossible  to  get  any  one  to  acknowledge  that 
he  was  a  headman,  or  to  find  out  who  and  where  they 
were.  I  think  they  did  supply  us  with  some  firewood, 
and  they  sold  a  lamb  to  Phooleyram  and  Nurdass, " 
that  these  Kunaits  might  have  it  killed  as  their  religion 
requires,  not  by  having  the  throat  cut,  but  the  head  cut 
or  hacked  off  from  above  at  the  neck-joint.  That  was 
all  they  would  do,  however ;  and  they  impounded  one  of 
our  yaks,  on  a  doubtful  charge  of  trespassing,  and  only 
released  it  on  payment  of  a  small  sum. 

I  was  particularly  anxious  to  find  some  official  to  deal 
with  ;  but  though  there  were  Tartar  soldiers  about,  one 
of  whom  we  came  upon  by  surprise,  it  was  impossible 
to  get  any  one  to  acknowledge  that  he  was  an  official,  or 
to  unearth  one  anywhere.  In  an  unguarded  moment 
some  of  the  villagers  told  us  that  they  were  ordered  by 
the  Tzong-pon,  or  "commander  of  the  fort"  {Tzong 
meaning  a  fort,  and  pon  a  general  or  chief*),  not  to  let 
us  pass  ;  but  no  fort  was  visible,  or  general  either;  and 
when  we  inquired  further  about  this  officer,  they  affected 
not  to  know  what  we  were  talking  about.  But  the  Tzong- 
pon  at  Shipki  means  the  Tzong-pon  of  D'zabrung,  the 
governor  of  the  district.  (This  place  is  the  Chaprang  of 
Montgomerie's  map  :  it  has  a  fort,  and  is  said  to  be  about 
eight  marches  distant  from  Shipki.)  But  no  one  would 
undertake  to  forward  a  letter  to  the  Tzong-pon,  or  pro- 
duce any  authority  from  him  for  refusing  to  allow  us  to 
proceed  farther. 


*  So  also  mak-pon,  a  general  of  troops ;  det-pon,  the  commander  of  a 
boat  ;  Isik-pon,  an  architect ;  chir-pon,  a  superintendent  of  stables  ;  and 
zol-pon,  a  head  cook. 


142  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

For  all  this  I  was  in  a  manner  prepared,  because 
several  attempts  had  previously  been  made  in  vain  to 
enter  Chinese  Tibet  by  this  door.  My  object  in  going 
to  Shipki  was  simply  to  see  for  myself  how  the  frontier 
matter  stood,  and  to  have  a  look  at  Chinese  Tartary  and 
Tartars.  I  never  supposed  for  a  moment  that,  on  a  first 
experience  of  Himaliyan  travel,  and  without  a  basis  of 
operations  near  the  frontier,  I  could  penetrate  for  any 
distance  into  Chinese  Tibet ;  and  at  the  utmost  contem- 
plated only  the  possibility  of  making  a  few  days'  jour- 
ney across  the  frontier,  though  I  should  have  been  quite 
ready  to  go  on  all  the  three  months'  journey  from 
Shipki  to  Lassa  had  the  way  been  at  all  open.  It  struck 
me  there  was  a  chance  of  getting  over  the  frontier  diffi- 
culty by  going  back  to  Kunawar,  purchasing  yaks  there, 
and  then  recrossing  the  Kung-ma  and  passing  Shipki 
by  night ;  but  the  time  I  could  have  afforded  for  this 
experiment  had  been  consumed  during  the  month  of 
my  illness  at  Pu,  and  I  had  the  alternative  before  me  of 
either  not  making  such  an  attempt,  or  of  relinquishing 
all  hope  of  reaching  Kashmir  before  it  was  closed  for 
the  season,  or  even  of  seeing  much  of  the  Himaliya.  I  had 
no  hesitation  in  preferring  to  go  on  to  Kashmir.  It  was 
not  as  if  I  were  going  back  in  doing  so.  In  point  of 
fact,  to  go  to  the  Valley  of  Flowers  by  the  route  I 
selected  and  followed  out,  was  to  plunge  into  a  still 
more  interesting  stretch  of  mountain  country,  and  into 
remote  Tibetan  provinces,  such  as  Zanskar,  situated  at 
what  may  fairly  be 'called  the  very  "  back  of  beyont," 
and  practically  as  secluded  from  the  world  and  as 
unknown  to  the  public  as  the  dominion  of  the  Grand 
Lama  itself.  It  was  also  very  doubtful  how  far  it  would 
be  possible  to  advance  into  Chinese  Tibet  by  having 
yaks  of  one's  own  and  passing  Shipki  by  night,  because 
a   few  miles  beyond  that   village    the  road  crosses  the 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  143 

Sutlej,  and  the  only  way  of  passing  that  river  there  is 
over  a  bridge  which  is  guarded  by  Tartar  troops.  The 
Kunawar  men  told  us  of  this,  and  they  know  the 
country  well  ;  for  the  objection  to  the  entrance  of 
Europeans  does  not  apply  to  themselves,  and  in  summer 
they  are  in  the  habit  of  trading  some  way  into  the 
interior  of  Chinese  Tibet  with  blankets,  sugar,  tobacco, 
and  wool,  bringing  back  rock-salt,  shawl-wool,  and  borax. 
They  also  mentioned  that  a  few  days'  journey  beyond 
the  frontier,  they  were  exposed  to  much  danger  from 
mounted  robbers,  there  being  hardly  any  villages  or 
houses  until  they  get  to  D'zabrung  or  to  Gartop,  except 
a  small  village  within  sight  of  Shipki ;  and  one  of  them 
showed  us  deep  scars  upon  his  head,  which  had  been 
severely  cut  by  these  robbers.  In  travelling  among  the 
Himaliya,  one  must  necessarily  keep  to  the  roads,  such 
as  they  are,  and  the  only  way  of  crossing  the  deep-cut 
furious  rivers  is  by  the  bridges  which  have  been  thrown 
across  them  ;  so  that  a  bridge  with  a  guard  of  soldiers 
would  in  all  probability  be  an  impassable  obstacle, 
except  to  an  armed  force.  But,  once  past  the  Sutlej 
and  on  the  rolling  hills  of  Tartary,  it  would  be  possible 
to  wander  about  freely  in  many  directions.  The  Shipki 
people  told  us  that  if  we  persisted  in  going  on  without 
their  assistance,  they  would  use  force  to  prevent  us, 
defending  this  by  their  favourite  argument  that  they 
mi'dit  as  well  be  killed  fightinsr  us  as  be  killed  letting:  us 
pass.  Could  we  have  procured  even  very  limited  means 
of  conveyance,  I  for  my  part  should  have  tested  this  ; 
but  I  was  scarcely  able  at  the  time  to  walk  at  all  ;  and  I 
have  not  the  least  doubt,  from  their  demeanour,  that 
they  would  have  carried  out  their  threat,  and  would  even 
have  been  delighted  to  do  so ;  for  it  more  than  once 
looked  as  if  they  only  wanted  the  slightest  pretext  in 
order  to  fall  upon  us,  and  were  chiefly  prevented  from 


U4  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

doing-  so  by  their  respect  for  Mr  Pagell  as  a  teacher  of  reli- 
gion and  a  dispenser  of  medicines.  Wc  might  safely 
conclude,  then,  that  the  soldiers  at  the  bridge  would  be 
equally  intractable  ;  and  it  is  difficult  to  say  what  one 
might  meet  with  in  the  country  beyond — how  soon  one 
might  be  robbed  of  everything,  and  find  one's  head 
adorning  the  pole  of  a  nomad's  tent.  The  Abbe  Des- 
godins,  who  lived  for  some  time  in  the  Lassa  territory 
towards  the  Chinese  frontier,  asserts  that  the  Tartar  of 
that  country  takes  great  pleasure,  when  he  has  an  enemy, 
in  persuading  that  enemy  that  he  is  quite  reconciled  to 
him,  in  asking  him  to  a  generous  dinner,  and  in  suddenly 
"firing  a  bullet  into  his  enemy's  stomach,  when  that  de- 
luded individual  is  supposed  to  have  reached  the  moment 
of  repletion.  If  such  be  the  way  in  which  the  inhabi- 
tants of  the  country  of  the  Sacred  Religion  treat  their 
friends,  it  can  easily  be  imagined  that,  when  they  fell  in 
with  a  stranger,  they  would  not  even  be  at  the  expense 
of  providing  a  good  dinner  for  him,  unless  that  were 
absolutely  necessary  to  throw  him  off  his  guard.  No 
doubt  it  is  only  a  portion  of  the  population  which  are  in 
the  habit  of  indulging  in  such  hospitality  ;  but  the  diffi- 
culty would  be  to  distinguish  between  that  portion  and 
the  more  respectable  inhabitants.  Two  or  three  years 
ago  the  tribute  which  is  annually  sent  up  from  Nepal 
to  Lassa  was  seized  and  appropriated  by  Tartars  on  the 
way  ;  and  on  their  being  told  that  it  was  for  the  Lassa 
Government,  they  replied  that  they  did  not  care  for  any 
government.  Possibly  such  rovers  might  be  afraid  to 
meddle  with  Europeans,  but  that  could  not  be  relied  on; 
and  it  would  be  almost  impossible  for  one  or  two  travel- 
lers to  secure  themselves  against  a  night  attack. 

Hence,  if  the  explorer  gets  beyond  Shipki,  and 
beyond  the  bridge  over  the  Sutlej,  it  does  not  neces- 
sarily follow  that  he  will  reach  D'zabrung  or  anywhere 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  145 

else  ;  but  I  expect  the  bridge  will  be  his  main  difficulty  ; 
and  I  have  heard  of  an  amusing  story  connected  with 
a  bridge — of  an  officer  who  attempted  to  enter  Chinese 
Tibet  at  some  other  point.  He  managed  to  give  the 
guard  on  the  frontier  the  slip  at  night,  and  was  happily 
pursuing  his  way  next  morning,  congratulating  himself 
on  having  entered  into  the  forbidden  land,  when  he  was 
overtaken  by  a  portion  of  the  guard,  who  politely  inti- 
mated that,  since  they  saw  he  was  determined  to  go, 
they  would  make  no  more  objection  to  his  doing  so, 
only  they  would  accompany  him,  in  order  to  protect 
him  from  robbers.  This  airangement  worked  very  well 
for  a  few  hours,  until  they  came  to  a  deep-sunk  river 
and  a  rope  bridge — one  of  those  bridges  in  which  you 
are  placed  in  a  basket,  which  is  slung  from  a  rope,  and 
so  pulled  along  that  rope  by  another  and  a  double  rope, 
which  allows  of  the  basket  being  worked  from  either 
side.  Over  this  river  some  of  the  Tartars  passed  first, 
in  order  to  show  that  the  conveyance  was  warranted  not 
to  break  down  ;  and  then  our  traveller  himself  got  into 
the  basket  and  was  pulled  along.  So  far  everything 
had  gone  on  well  ;  but,  when  he  had  got  half-way  across 
the  river,  his  protectors  ceased  to  pull,  sat  down,  lighted 
their  pipes,  and  looked  at  him  as  they  might  at  an  in- 
teresting object  which  had  been  provided  for  their  con- 
templation. "  Pull  1 "  he  cried  out,  "pull!"  on  which 
they  nodded  their  heads  approvingly,  but  sat  still  and 

smoked  their  pipes.     "  D n  it,  pull,  will  you  ?  />?////" 

he  cried  out  again,  becoming  weary  of  the  basket ;  and 
then  he  tried  all  the  equivalents  for  "  pull  "  in  all  the 
Eastern  languages  he  knew  ;  but  the  more  he  cried  out, 
the  more  the  Tartars  smoked  their  silver  pipes  and 
nodded  their  heads,  like  Chinese  porcelain  mandarins. 
The)-  interfered,  however,  to  prevent  his  pulling  himself 
one  way  or  another  ;  and,  after  keeping  him  suspended 

K 


146  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

in  the  basket  till  night,  and  he  was  almost  frozen  to 
death,  they  made  an  agreement,  through  a  Tibetan- 
speaking  attendant,  that  they  would  pull  him  back  if  he 
would  promise  to  recross  the  frontier. 

If  half  the  stories  be  true  which  Mr  Pagell  has  heard 
from  Lamas  of   the   punishments   inflicted   in    Chinese 
Tibet,  it  is  no  wonder  that  the  people  of  that  country 
are   extremely   afraid   of  disobeying   the  orders  of  the 
Government   whenever  they   are    so   situated   as  to   be 
within  the   reach    of  Government  officers.     Crucifying, 
ripping  open  the  body,  pressing   and    cutting   out   the 
eyes,  are  by  no  means  the  worst  of  these  punishments. 
One  mode  of  putting  to  death,  which  is  sometimes  in- 
flicted, struck  me  as  about  the  most  frightful  instance  of 
diabolical  cruelty  I  had  ever  heard  of,  and  worse  than 
anything    portrayed   in  the  old   chamber  of  horrors  at 
Canton.     The  criminal  is  buried  in  the  ground  up  to  the 
neck,  and  the  ground   is  trampled  on  round  him  suffi- 
ciently to  prevent  him  moving  hand  or  foot,  though  not 
so  as  to  prevent  his  breathing  with  tolerable  freedom. 
His  mouth  is  then  forced  open,  and  an  iron  or  wooden 
spike  sharpened  at  both  ends,  is  carefully  placed  in  it  so 
that  he  cannot  close  his  mouth  again.     Nor  is  the  tor- 
ture confined  to  leaving  him  to  perish  in  that  miserable 
condition.     Ants,  beetles,  and  other  insects  are  collected 
and  driven  to   take  refuge  in  his  mouth,  nostrils,  ears, 
and  eyes.     Can  the  imagination  conceive  of   anything 
more    dreadful  ?     Even    the    writhing   caused    by   pain, 
which  affords  some  relief,  is  here  impossible  except  just 
at  the  neck  ;  and  a  guard  being  placed  over  the  victim, 
he  is  left  to  be  thus  tortured  by  insects  until  he  expires. 
The  frame  of  mind   which  can  devise  and  execute  such 
atrocities  is  almost  inconceivable  to  the  European  ;  and 
we  must  hope  that   a  punishment  of  this  kind  is  he'd  in 
terrorem  over  the  Tibetans,  rather  than  actually  inflicted. 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  147 

But  I  am  afraid  it  is  put  in  force  ;  and  we  know  too 
much  of  Chinese  and  Tartar  cruelties  to  think  there  is 
any  improbability  in  its  being  so.  It  is  certain  that  the 
Turanian  race  is  remarkably  obtuse-nerved  and  insen- 
sible to  pain,  which  goes  some  way  to  account  for  the 
cruelty  of  its  punishments  ;  but  that  cannot  justify  them. 
In  other  ways,  also,  Tartar  discipline  must  be  very 
rigorous.  Gerard  was  told  that  where  there  is  a  regular 
horse-post— as  between  Lassa  and  Gartop — "the  bundle 
is  sealed  fast  to  the  rider,  who  is  again  sealed  to  his 
horse  ;  and  no  inconvenience,  however  great,  admits  of 
his  dismounting  until  he  reaches  the  relief-stage,  where 
the  seal  is  examined!"  I  heard  something  about  men 
being  sealed  up  this  way  for  a  ride  of  twenty-four 
hours  ;  and  if  that  be  true,  the  horses  must  have  as 
much  endurance  as  the  men. 

The  question  arises  why  it  is  that  the  Lassa  authori- 
ties are  so  extremely  anxious  to  keep  all  Europeans  out 
of  their  country.  The  Tibetans  lay  the  blame  of  this 
on  the  Chinese  Mandarins,  and  the  Mandarins  on 
Lamas  and  the  people  of  Tibet  ;  but  they  appear  all  to 
combine  in  ensuring  the  result.  This  is  the  more  re- 
markable, because  the  Lama  country  is  not  one  with 
which  Europeans  are  in  contact,  or  one  which  they  are 
pressing  on  in  any  way.  It  is  pretty  well  dtfeiidu 
naturally,  owing  to  the  almost  impassable  deserts  and 
great  mountains  by  which  it  is  surrounded  ;  and  it  has 
by  no  means  such  an  amount  of  fertile  land  as  to  make 
it  a  desirable  object  of  conquest  as  a  revenue-bearing 
province.  The  reason  assigned,  by  letter,  in  1870  to  the 
Abbe  Desgodins,  by  the  two  legates  at  Lassa — the  one 
representing  the  Emperor  of  China,  and  the  other  the 
Grand  Lama — for  refusing  to  allow  him  to  enter  Tibet, 
was  as  follows: — "  Les  contrees  thibdtaines  sont  con- 
sacrees    aux    supplications    et    aux  prieres  ;   la  religion 


148  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO  W. 

jaune  est  fondee  sur  la  justice  et  la  droite  raison  ;  elle 
est  adoptee  depuis  un  grand  nombre  de  siecles  ;  on  ne 
doit  done  pas  precher  dans  ces  contrees  une  religion 
etrangere  ;  nos  peuples  ne  doivent  avoir  aucun  rapport 
aux  homines  des  autres  royaumes."  This,  however, 
is  evasive  ;  and,  though  they  are  different  in  the  east  of 
Tibet,  the  Lamas  at  Shipki  made  not  the  least  objec- 
tion to  Mr  Pagell  preaching  as  much  as  he  liked  ;  they 
argued  with  him  in  quite  an  amicable  manner,  and 
afforded  us  protection. 

Is  it  possible  that  the  gold — or,  to  speak  more  gene- 
rally, the  mineral — deposits  in  Tibet  may  have  some- 
thing to  do  with  the  extreme  anxiety  of  the  Chinese  to 
keep  us  out  of  that  country  ?  They  must  know  that, 
without  some  attraction  of  the  kind,  only  a  few  adven- 
turous missionaries  and  travellers  would  think  of  going 
into  so  sterile  a  country,  which  can  yield  but  little  trade, 
and  which  is  in  many  parts  infested  by  bands  of  hardy 
and  marauding  horsemen.  But  the  Mandarins  have 
quite  enough  information  to  be  well  aware  that  if  it 
were  known  in  Europe  and  America  that  large  gold- 
fields  existed  in  Tibet,  and  that  the  anri  sacra  fames 
might  there,  for  a  time  at  least,  be  fully  appeased,  no 
supplications,  or  prayers  either,  would  suffice  to  pre- 
vent a  rush  into  it  of  occidental  rowdies  ;  and  that  thus 
an. energetic  and  boisterous  white  community  might 
soon  be  established  to  the  west  of  the  Flowery  Land, 
and  would  give  infinite  trouble,  both  by  enforcing  the 
right  of  passage  through  China,  and  by  threatening  it 
directly. 

That  there  is  gold  in  Chinese  Tibet  does  not  admit  of 
a  doubt;  and,  in  all  probability,  it  could  be  procured 
there  in  large  quantities  were  the  knowledge  and  appli- 
ances of  California  and  Australia  set  to  work  in  search 
of  it.     In  the  Sutlej  valley,  it  is  at  the  Chinese  border 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  149 

that  the  clay-slates,  mica-schists,  and  gneiss  give  way 
to  quartz  and  exceedingly  quartzose  granite — the  rocks 
which  most  abound  in  gold.  The  rolling  hills  across 
the  frontier  are  similar  in  structure  to  those  which  lead 
to  the  Californian  Sierra  Nevada,  and  are  probably 
composed  of  granite  gravel.  In  our  Himaliya,  and  in 
that  of  the  native  states  tributary  to  us,  there  is  not 
much  granite  or  quartz,  and  gneiss  is  the  predominant 
rock  of  the  higher  peaks  and  ranges.  But  granite  (and, 
to  a  less  degree,  trap)  has  been  the  elevating  power. 
There  has  been  a  considerable  outburst  of  granite  at 
Gangotrf  and  Kiddernath,  and  the  consequence  is  that 
gold  is  found,  though  in  small  quantities,  in  the  streams 
beneath.  Among  this  great  range  of  mountains  there 
are  various  rivers, 

"  Whose  foam  is  amber  and  their  gravel  gold." 

The  district  of  Gunjarat  in  the  Hindu  Kush,  north-east 
of  the  Chittral  valley,  is  named  on  account  of  its  gold. 
Kafiristan,  in  the  same  direction,  produces  gold,  which 
is  made  into  ornaments  and  utensils.  Badakshan  is 
celebrated  for  its  veins  of  the  precious  metal,  as  well  as 
for  its  rubies  and  lapis  lazuli.  Also  at  Fauladut,  near 
Bamfan,  and  in  the  hills  of  Istalif  north  of  Kauiuil, 
gold  is  found.  It  is  washed  out  of  the  upper  bed  of  the 
Indus  in  certain  parts  where  that  bed  is  accessible,  and 
also  from  the  sands  of  the  Indus  immediately  after  it 
emerges  at  Torbela  on  to  the  Panjab  plain.  We  have 
it,  too,  in  the  bed  of  the  Chayok  river.  Gold  is  also 
washed  out  of  the  bed  of  the  Sutlej,  a  little  below  Kot- 
ghar,  where  the  people  can  get  down  to  that  bed.  Now, 
where  does  that  latter  gold  come  from  ?  We  may  go  a 
long  way  up  the  Sutlej  before  finding  rocks  likely  to 
produce  any  of  that  metal,  unless  in  the  minutest 
quantities  ;    but   advance  up  that   river  to  the  Chinese 


150  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW, 

frontier,  and  we  come  upon  a  stretch  of  country  which  is 
extremely  likely  to  be  the  matrix  of  vast  gold  deposits. 
Great  quantities  of  gold  may  be  washed  out  of  that 
region  by  the  Sutlej,  and  yet  not  much  of  it  find  its 
way  below  Kotghar,  because  so  heavy  a  metal  soon 
sinks  into  the  bed  of  the  stream.  Nor  does  this  sup- 
position depend  entirely  upon  my  unsupported  geo- 
logical conjecture  ;  because  it  is  well  known  to  the 
Kunawar  people  that  gold  is  found  in  Tibet,  not  very 
far  from  Shipki.  The  largest  of  these  gold-fields  are  at 
Shok  Jalung,  the  Thok  Jalung  of  Major  Montgomerie, 
which  is  in  lat.  320  24',  and  long.  8i°  37',  at  a  height  de- 
scribed as  about  16,000  feet.  But  there  are  many  more 
of  them,  especially  about  Damu,  near  the  Sutlej,  not 
far  from  its  source,  and  at  Gartop,  close  to  the  Indus. 
The  fact  that  not  only  gold-washings  but  even  gold- 
mines are'reported  to  exist  in  that  part  of  the  country 
between  the  two  rivers,  affords  pretty  conclusive  proof, 
when  taken  in  connection  with  the  geological  aspect  of 
the  hills,  so  far  as  can  be  seen  from  the  Kung-ma  Pass, 
that  the  western  part  at  least  of  Chinese  Tibet  has  im- 
portant gold-fields.  Of  course  the  people  there  have 
no  means  of  working  their  mines  effectually,  and  the 
Lama  religion  does  not  encourage  the  search  for  pre- 
cious metals  ;  but  it  would  be  very  different  if  the  appli- 
ances of  civilisation  were  brought  to  bear  on  the  matter. 
Besides  gold,  Chinese  Tibet  possesses  silver,  mercury, 
iron,  cinnabar,  nitre,  lapis  lazuli,  borax,  and  rock-salt. 
The  quantity  of  turquoises  which  it  can  turn  out  ap- 
pears to  be  almost  unlimited,  and  the  women  of  all  the 
Ilimdliya  richly  ornament  their  hair  and  dress  with 
these  gems — those  about  the  size  of  a  hazel-nut  being 
the  most  common.  It  is  doubtful,  however,  whether 
the  metals  enumerated  above  are  to  be  found  in  the 
country  to  any  great  extent,  though  there  is  no  reason 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  151 

to  suppose  that  some  of  them  may  not  be  so.  A  most 
serious  want  is  that  of  fuel.  It  is  quite  unlikely  that 
there  is  any  coal,  and  wood  is  extremely  scarce.  On 
the  east  side  there  are  great  forests  here  and  there  ;  but, 
on  the  elevated  plains  of  the  west,  the  Tartars  have  to 
depend  for  their  fires  almost  entirely  on  furze  and  the 
droppings  of  their  flocks.  This  must  create  a  serious 
obstacle  in  the  way  of  working  mines,  and  of  a  mining 
population  existing  at  such  a  height;  but  if  only  gold 
exists  up  there  in  great  abundance  it  is  an  obstacle 
which  might  be  profitably  overcome  by  the  resources  of 
modern  science. 

There  is  no  less  reason  to  believe  that  Eastern  Tibet 
abounds  in  the  precious  metals.  The  Abbe  Desgodins 
writes  that  "  le  sable  d'or  se  trouves  dans  toutes  les 
rivieres  et  meme  dans  les  petits  ruisseaux  du  Thibet 
oriental  ;"  and  he  mentions  that  in  the  town  of  Bathan, 
or  Batan,  with  which  he  was  personally  acquainted, 
about  twenty  persons  were  regularly  occupied  in  secretly 
washing  for  gold,  contrary  to  the  severe  laws  of  the 
country.  At  other  places  many  hundreds  engaged  in 
the  same  occupation.  He  also  mentions  five  gold-mines 
and  three  silver-mines  as  worked  in  the  Tchong-tien 
province  in  the  upper  Yang-tse  valley  ;  and  in  the  valley 
of  the  Mey-kong  river  there  are  seven  mines  of  gold, 
eight  of  silver,  and  several  more  of  other  metals.  He 
also  mentions  a  large  number  of  other  districts,  in  each 
of  which  there  is  quite  a  number  of  gold  and  silver- 
mines,  besides  mines  of  mercury,  iron,  and  copper.  It 
is  no  wonder,  then,  that  a  Chinese  proverb  speaks  of 
Tibet  as  being  at  once  the  most  elevated  and  the  richest 
country  in  the  world,  and  that  the  Mandarins  are  so 
anxious  to  keep  Europeans  out  of  it.  If  the  richest 
mineral  treasures  in  the  world  lie  there,  as  we  have  so 
much  reason  to  suppose,  there  is  abundant  reason  why 


152  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO IV. 

strangers  should  be  kept  out  of  it,  and  why  it  should  be 
kept  sacred  for  the  Yellow  Religion,  for  supplications 
and  prayers. 

The  area  of  Tibet  is  partly  a  matter  of  conjecture, 
and  the  best  geographers  set  it  down  as  between  six  and 
seven  hundred  thousand  square  miles,  with  a  very  con- 
jectural population  of  ten  millions.  With  Mongolia  on 
the  north ;  Turkestan,  Kunawar,  and  the  mountainous 
dependencies  of  Kashmir  on  the  west;  Nepal,  Sikkim, 
and  Bhotan,  with  their  Himaliya,  on  the  south  ;  and  the 
Chinese  province  of  Yunnan  on  the  east, — it  is  about  as 
well  lifted  out  of  and  defended  from  the  world  as  any 
country  could  be;  and  although  Lassa  is  about  the  same 
latitude  as  Cairo  and  New  Orleans,  yet  the  great  eleva- 
tion of  the  whole  country  (which  may  be  roughly  called 
a  tableland  of  from  15,000  to  16,000  feet  high)  gives  it 
almost  an  arctic  climate.  The  great  cluster  of  moun- 
tains called  the  Thibetan  Kailas  (the  height  of  which 
remains  unascertained,  and  some  of  the  peaks  of  which 
may  be  even  higher  than  Gaurisankar)  well  deserves  to 
be  called  the  centre  of  the  world.  It  is,  at  least,'  the 
greatest  centre  of  elevation,  and  the  point  from  whence 
flow  the  Sutlej,  the  Indus,  and  the  Brahmaputra;  while 
to  Tibet,  meaning  by  that  word  the  whole  country  in 
which  Tibetan  is  spoken,  we  may  ascribe  most  of  the 
rivers  of  the  Panjab,  and  also  the  Jumna,  the  Ganges, 
the  Irrawaddi,  the  Yang-tse,  and  even  the  Hoang-Ho, 
or  great  Yellow  River.  The  pass  at  Shipki,  over  which 
I  crossed,  is  one  of  the  lowest  of  the  passes  into  Chinese 
Tibet.  There  is  another  and  more  difficult  pass  close 
to  it,  about  12,500  feet  high  ;  but  the  others  are  of  great 
height,  and  the  Mana  Pass,  between  Tibet  and  Gunvhal, 
is  18,570  feet.  Though  Lassa  is  the  capital  ot  the  whole 
country,  Teshu  Lambu,  said  to  have  a  population  of 
about  50,000,  is   the  capital  of  the  western  division  of 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  153 

Chinese  Tibet,  and  is  the  residence  of  the  Bogda  Lama, 
the  highest  spiritual  authority  after  the  Grand  Lama. 

The  young  persons  of  Shipki  had  none  of  the  shame- 
.facedness  of  the  women  of  India.  They  would  come 
and  sit  down  before  our  tents  and  laugh  at  us,  or  talk 
with  us.  It  was  quite  evident  that  we  were  a  source  of 
great  amusement  to  them.  They  were  certainly  rather 
robust  than  beautiful ;  but  one  girl,  who  had  come  from 
the  other  side  of  Lassa,  would  have  been  very  good- 
looking  had  she  been  well  washed.  This  Tartar  beauty 
had  a  well-formed  head,  regular  features,  and  a  reddish- 
brown  complexion.  She  was  expensively  adorned,  and 
was  probably  the  relative  of  some  official  who  thought 
it  best  to  keep  in  the  background.  In  fact,  she  was 
very  handsome  indeed,  lively  and  good-humoured  ;  but 
there  was  the  slight  drawback  that  her  face  had  never 
been  washed  since  the  day  of  her  birth.  Another  young 
girl  belonging  to  Shipki  tempted  some  of  our  Namgea 
men  into  a  mild  flirtation  ;  but  whenever  they  offered  to 
touch  her  it  was  a  matter  of  tooth  and  nails  at  once. 
Mr  Pagell's  conversation  with  the  people  on  the  subject 
of  religion  was  well  enough  received,  though  his  state- 
ments were  not  allowed  to  go  uncontroverted,  and  his 
medical  advice  was  much  preferred.  In  talking  with  us, 
the  men  were  rather  rude  in  their  manner,  and,  after 
staying  for  a  little,  they  would  suddenly  go  away,  laugh- 
ing, and  slapping  their  persons  in  a  way  that  was  far 
from  respectful. 

Both  men  and  women  wore  long  tunics  and  loose 
trousers,  a  reddish  colour  being  predominant,  and  also 
large  cloth  Tartar  boots  :  but  during  the  heat  of  the  day 
many  of  both  sexes  dispensed  with  the  boots,  and  some 
ot  the  men  appeared  with  the  upper  part  of  their  bodies 
entirely  naked.  All  the  men  had  pigtails,  and  they 
wore  caps  like  the  ordinary  Chinese  skull-caps,  though, 


154  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

from  dirt  and  perspiration,  the  original  colour  and  orna- 
mentation were  not  distinguishable.  The  women  had 
some  pigtails,  some  plaits,  and  were  richly  ornamented 
with  turquoises,  opals,  pieces  of  amber,  shells  (often 
made  into  immense  bracelets),  corals,  and  gold  and 
silver  amulets  ;  while  the  men  had  metal  pipes,  knives, 
and  ornamented  daggers  stuck  in  their  girdles.  The 
oblique  eye  and  prominent  cheekbones  were  noticeable, 
though  not  in  very  marked  development ;  and  though 
the  noses  were  thick  and  muscular,  they  were  sometimes 
straight  or  aquiline.  The  bodies  were  well  developed, 
large,  and  strong ;  but  the  men  struck  me  as  dispropor- 
tionally  taller  than  the  women.  The  weather  being 
warm,  hardly  any  one  appeared  in  sheepskins,  and  most 
of  their  garments  were  of  thick  woollen  stuff,  though  the 
girl  from  beyond  Lassa  wore  a  tunic  of  the  ordinary 
thick,  glazed,  black,  Chinese-made  flaxen  cloth.  We 
did  not  obtain  permission  to  enter  any  of  their  houses, 
wh'ch  were  strongly  built  and  roofed  of  stone,  but  saw 
sufficient  to  indicate  that  these  were  dark  uncleanly 
habitations,  almost  devoid  of  furniture. 

Shipki  is  a  large  village  in  the  sub-district  of  Rong- 
chung,  with  a  number  of  terraced  fields,  apricot-trees, 
apple-trees,  and  gooseberry-bushes.  It  is  watered  by 
streams  artificially  led  to  it  from  the  glaciers  and  snow- 
beds  to  the  south-west  of  the  Kung-ma  Pass,  where 
there  are  great  walls  of  snow  and  snowy  peaks  about 
20,000  feet  high.  Twenty-four  of  its  zemindars,  or  pro- 
prietors of  land,  pay  a  tax  amounting  to  £5  yearly  to 
the  Government,  and  the  remainder  pay  smaller  sums. 
The  population  numbers  about  20CO,  and  they  have  not 
exactly  the  typical  Tartar  countenance,  though  with 
clearly-marked  Tartar  characteristics,  and  there  were 
two  or  three  strangers  among  them  whose  features  were 
purely  Turanian.     The  people  of  Shipki  have  a  striking 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  155 

resemblance  to  the  country  Chinese  of  the  province  of 
Shantung,  and  they  were  large,  able-bodied,  and  rath'er 
brutal  in  their  manners, — not  a  trace  of  Chinese  for- 
mality or  politeness  being  apparent.  The  village  is 
separated  into  several  divisions  ;  the  houses  are  not  close 
together,  and  the  steep  paths  between  them  are  execra- 
ble, being  little  more  than  stairs  of  rock  with  huge  steps. 
The  gooseberry-bushes,  however,  gave  a  pleasant  ap- 
pearance to  the  place,  and  the  unripe  berries  promised 
to  reach  a  considerable  size.  Of  course  the  whole  dis- 
trict is  almost  perfectly  rainless,  and  the  air  is  so  dry  as 
to  crack  the  skin  of  Europeans.  It  must  get  very  little 
sun  in  winter,  and  be  excessively  cold  at  that  season; 
but  in  summer  the  climate  is  mild,  and  hottish  during 
the  day.  The  thermometer  outside  my  tent  was  560  at 
sunrise;  but  it  was  840  Fahr.  at  2  P.M.  inside  the  tent, 
with  a  breeze  blowing  through.  The  bed  of  the  Sutlej 
near  Shipki  is  about  9500  feet  high,  which  is  a  remark- 
able elevation  for  so  large  a  river. 

Finding  it  hopeless  to  pass  Shipki,  at  all  events  with- 
out going  back  to  Kunawar,  and  purchasing  yaks  of  my 
own,  I  determined  to  proceed  to  Kashmir,  high  up 
along  the  whole  line  of  the  Western  Himaliya  ;  and, 
indeed,  I  did  not  manage  to  reach  that  country  a  day 
too  soon,  for  I  narrowly  escaped  being  snowed  up  for 
the  winter  in  the  almost  unknown  province  of  Zanskar. 
Mr  Pagell  also  acknowledged  the  hopelessness  of  at- 
tempting to  proceed  farther  into  the  dominions  of  the 
Grand  Lama,  so  we  left  Shipki  on  the  afternoon  of  the 
1  oth  August;  and  though  the  thermometer  had  been  at 
82°  in  our  tents  shortly  before  starting,  we  camped  that 
night  with  it  at  570  before  sunset  in  a  pure  bracing 
atmosphere  at  the  Shipki  Rizhing,  or  Shipki  Fields, 
about  2500  feet  higher  up  on  the  Kung-ma  Pass,  but  on 
the  eastern  side  of  it,  and  still  within  the  Chinese  border. 


156  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Here  we  had  a  remarkable  example  of  the  courage  and 
ferocity  of  the  Tartars.  On  leaving-  the  outskirts  of 
Shipki,  our  coolies  had  plucked  and  taken  away  with 
them  some  unripe  apples;  and  at  the  Shipki  Rizhing, 
where  there  are  no  houses,  only  an  empty  unroofed  hut 
or  two  for  herdsmen,  a  solitary  Tartar  made  his  appear- 
ance, and  observing  the  apples,  declared  that  they  were 
his,  and,  abusing  the  coolies  for  taking  them,  straight- 
wax-  fell  upon  the  man  in  possession  of  them,  tore  that 
individual's  hair,  and  knocked  him  about  in  the  most 
savage  manner.  Though  there  were  over  twenty  of  the 
Kunawar  men  looking  on,  and  several  of  them  were  im- 
plicated in  the  theft,  if  such  it  might  be  called,  yet  none 
of  them  ventured  to  interfere;  and  their  companion 
might  have  received  serious  injury,  had  not  Chota  Khan 
who  was  always  ready  for  a  fray  of  the  kind,  gone  in  and 
separated  the  two.  Now  this  was  between  two  and 
three  thousand  feet  above  the  village,  and  I  doubt  if 
there  were  any  other  Tartars  about  the  spot,  except  one 
other  man  who  had  come  to  see  us  off  the  premises. 
Ferocity  is  much  admired  in  Chinese  Tibet;  and  in- 
order  to  create  it,  the  people  are  fond  of  eating  what 
the}- ironically  call  "  still  meat,"  or  meat  with  maggots 
in  it.  We  heard  also  that,  to  the  same  end,  they  give  a 
very  curious  pap  to  their  infants.  Meat,  cut  into  thin 
slices,  is  dried  in  the  sun  and  ground  into  powder;  it  is 
then  mixed  with  fresh  blood  and  put  into  a  cotton  cloth 
and  so  given  to  the  enfant  terrible  to  suck.  Mixtures 
such  as  this,  combined  with  half-raw  flesh,  sun-dried 
flesh,  and,  where  there  is  cultivation,  with  girdle-cakes  of 
wheat,  buckwheat,  and  barley,  must  make  a  pretty 
strong  diet  even  for  the  seniors,  and  one  well  fitted  to  pro- 
duce endurance  and  courage.  It  is  to  be  hoped  the  milk 
(of  mares  and  other  animals)  which  the  nomad  Tartars 
so  largely  imbibe,  may  have  some  effect  in  mollifying 


CHINESE  TARTARS.  157 

the  ferocity  of  their  spirits.  It  is  very  extraordinary 
that  the  Chinese,  who  are  a  Tartar  people,  and  must 
have  descended  at  one  time  from  the  "  Land  of  Grass," 
should  so  entirely  eschew  the  use  of  milk  in  every 
shape.  For  long  there  was  a  difficulty  in  getting  even  a 
sufficiency  of  that  liquid  for  the  use  of  the  foreigners  at 
the  open  ports  in  China;  and  I  have  heard  of  a  ship 
captain  at  Whampoa,  on  blowing  up  his  comprador  for 
not  having  brought  him  any  milk,  receiving  the  indig- 
nant answer — "  That  pig  hab  killo,  that  dog  hab  weillo 
(run  away),  that  woman  hab  catchee  cheillo — how  then 
can  catchee  milk?"  A  Lama  at  Kaelang,  on  being 
spoken  to  on  this  subject,  admitted  that  he  had  ob- 
served that  even  at  Lassa  the  pure  Chinese  did  not  take 
any  milk ;  and  he  said  the  reason  they  gave  for  not 
doing  so  was,  that  milk  makes  people  stupid.  I  fancy 
there  is  some  truth  in  that  assertion  ;  but  possibly  the 
Chinese  may  have  got  the  idea  from  the  fact  that  the 
Tartars,  who  are  necessarily  milk-drinkers  and  eaters  of 
dried  milk  and  buttermilk,  are  a  very  stupid  people. 
Sir  Alexander  Burnes  mentions  a  similar  opinion  as 
existing  in  Sind  in  regard  to  the  effects  of  fish.  There, 
a  fish  diet  is  believed  to  destroy  the  mind  ;  and  in  pal- 
liation of  ignorance  or  stupidity  in  any  one,  it  is  often 
pleaded  that  "he  is  but  a  fish-eater."  Yet  this  diet, 
more  than  any  other,  if  our  modern  savants  can  be 
trusted,  supplies  the  brain  with  phosphorus  and  thought, 
so  it  is  calculated  to  make  people  the  reverse  of  stupid. 
The  next  day  we  started  before  daylight,  and  camped 
again  at  Namgea  Fields.  The  view  over  Tartary,  from 
the  summit  of  the  pass,  was  somewhat  obscured  by  the 
rising  sun,  which  cast  on  it  a  confusing  roseate  light; 
but  the  great  outlines  of  the  rolling  hills  and  windy 
steppes  were  visible.  I  should  be  glad  to  try  Chinese 
Tibet  again,  and  in  a  more  serious  way  ;  but  meanwhile 


158  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

I  had  all  the  Western  Himaliya  before  me,  from  Lfo 
Porgyul  to  the  26,000  peak  of  Nunga  Parbat,  besides 
the  Afghan  border,  and  I  had  satisfied  my  immediate 
purpose  by  seeing  some  of  the  primitive  Turanians,  and 
looking  on  their  wild,  high,  mountain  home. 


CHAPTER  V. 

H A  NCR  AN  G,  SPITI,  AND  TIBETAN  POLYANDRY. 

On  turning  north-westward  from  Chinese  Tibet,  I  set 
myself  to  the  task  of  traversing  the  whole  line  of  the 
Western  Himaliya,  from  Lfo  Porgyul  to  Kashmir  and 
the  Hindu  Kush,  in  the  interior  of  its  ranges,  at  a  height 
usually  about  12,000  feet,  and  through  the  provinces  of 
Hangrang,  Spiti,  Lahaul,  Zanskar,  Surii,  and  Dras. 
About  half  of  this  line  of  journey  is  not  to  be  found  in 
Montgomerie's  Routes,  and  it  involves  more  than  one 
passage  of  several  days  over  high  and  difficult  ground, 
where  there  are  no  villages,  no  houses,  and  scarcely  even 
any  wood.  Nevertheless,  it  commends  itself  as  a  sum- 
mer and  autumn  journey  to  the  traveller,  from  its  great 
elevation,  which  keeps  him  above  the  tremendous  heat 
of  the  gorges — from  its  singularly  pure  and  bracing  air 
• — from  the  protection  which  more  than  one  snowy  range 
affords  against  the  Indian  monsoon — from  the  awful 
sublimity  of  the  scenery — and  from  the  exceedingly 
primitive  and  essentially  Turanian  and  Lamaistic  cha- 
racter of  the  people  among  whom  he  has  to  sojourn. 

It  is  possible  to  hit  upon  this  line  of  journey  without 
essaying  the  arduous  task  of  visiting  Pu  and  Shipki,  be- 
cause there  is  a  path  from  Sungnam  to  Nako,  in  Hang- 
rang,  by  way  of  Li'o  and  Hango,  which,  though  it  goes 
over  the  Hangrang  Pass  at  an  altitude  of  14,530  feet, 
is  comparatively  easy.  But  from  Namgea  Rizhing  or 
Fields,  I  had  to  reach  Nako  by  crossing  the  Sutlej  and 
passing  over   a   shoulder   of  the   great   mountain    Lfo 


160  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

,  Porgyul  ;  so,  on  the  I2th  August,  we  made  the  steep 
ascent  to  the  village  of  Namgea,  and  from  there  to  a 
very  unpleasant //«//#  which  crosses  the  foaming  torrent 
of  the  Sutlej.  In  this  part  of  the  Himaliya,  and,  indeed, 
on  to  Kashmir,  these  bridges  are  constructed  of  twigs, 
chiefly  from  birch-trees  or  bushes,  twisted  together. 
Two  thick  ropes  of  these  twigs,  about  the  size  of  a  man's 
thigh,  or  a  little  larger,  are  stretched  across  the  river,  at 
a  distance  of  about  six  to  four  feet  from  each  other,  and 
a  similar  rope  runs  between  them,  three  or  four  feet 
lower,  being  connected  with  the  upper  ropes  by  more 
slender  ropes,  also  usually  of  birch  twigs  twisted  to- 
gether, but  sometimes  of  grass,  and  occurring  at  an 
interval  of  about  five  feet  from  each  other.  The  un- 
pleasantness of  a  jJii'da  is  that  the  passenger  has  no 
proper  hold  of  the  upper  ropes,  which  are  too  thick  and 
rough  to  be  grasped  by  the  hand  ;  and  that,  at  the 
extremities,  they  are  so  far  apart  that  it  is  difficult  to 
have  any  hold  of  both  at  the  same  time ;  while  the 
danger  is  increased  by  the  bend  or  hang  of  the  jhula, 
which  is  much  lower  in  the  middle  than  at  its  ends.  He 
has  also  to  stoop  painfully  in  order  to  move  along  it ; 
and  it  is  seldom  safe  for  him  to  rest  his  feet  on  the 
lower  rope,  except  where  it  is  supported  from  the  upper 
ropes  by  the  transverse  ones.  To  fall  into  the  raging 
torrent  underneath  would  be  almost  certain  destruction. 
The  high  wind  which  usually  prevails  in  the  Himaliya 
during  the  day  makes  the  whole  structure  swing  about 
frightfully.  In  the  middle  of  the  bridge  there  is  a  cross- 
bar of  wood  (to  keep  the  two  upper  ropes  separate),  which 
has  to  be  stepped  over;  and  it  is  not  customary  to  repair 
a  jliula  until  some  one  falls  through  it,  and  so  gives 
practical  demonstration  that  it  is  in  rather  a  rotten  state. 
One  of  these  bridges — at  Kokser  on  the  Chandra  river, 
but  now  superseded   by  a  wooden  bridge — may  have 


HANGRAKG,  SPITT,  AND  POLYANDRY.  161 

accelerated  the  death  of  Lord  Elgin  on  his  way  up  to 
Dharamsala.  When  crossing  over  it,  his  coat  was  caught 
on  the  birch  twigs  ;  and  his  progress  being  thus  arrested, 
he  was  unable  to  go  over  it  with  that  continuous,  but 
not  too  rapid  motion,  which  is  the  safest  way  of  dealing 
with  such  a  passage.  To  delay  on  a  bridge  of  this  kind, 
swinging  in  the  wind,  is  trying  to  the  strongest  nerves  ; 
and  I  know,  on  excellent  authority,  that  the  position  in 
which  he  was  thus  placed  had  probably  some  effect  in 
aggravating  the  heart  disease  from  which  this  Governor- 
General  died  not  many  days  afterwards. 

This  bridge  below  Namgea,  which  is  over  ioo  feet  in 
length,  is  a  particularly  bad  one,  because  there  is  so 
little  traffic  over  it  that  it  is  almost  never  repaired  ;  and 
Mr  Pagell  told  me  that  the  Namgea  people  were  at 
some  loss  to  know  how  I  was  to  be  got  across  in  my 
weak  and  disabled  state.  A  discussion  arose  amongst 
them  as  to  whether  the  jliida  would  bear  the  weight  of 
one  or  two  men  to  assist  me  over  it,  on  hearing  of  which 
I  could  not  help  laughing  quietly,  because,  however  unfit 
for  prolonged  muscular  exertion,  any  short  dangerous 
piece  of  work  was  just  what  I  liked.  Accordingly,  to 
the  wonder  and  admiration  of  the  mountaineers,  who 
could  not  distinguish  between  incapacity  for  walking  up 
6oco  feet  and  weakness  of  nerve,  I  took  the  jlriila  when- 
ever I  came  to  it,  without  stopping  to  think  of  it,  or 
looking  either  to  the  right  or  the  left  until  I  found  my- 
self safe  on  the  rocks  on  the  other  side.  Silas  followed 
my  example,  and,  with  his  lithe  Maratha  frame,  got 
over  it  in  splendid  style  ;  but  the  heavy  Chota  Khan 
nearly  stuck  in  the  middle,  at  the  cross-bar,  and  reached 
terra  firma  in  a  state  of  great  agitation.  Among  the 
people  who  carried  our  things,  there  was  the  comely 
wife  of  a  zemindar,  who  came  with  us  for  a  curious 
reason.     Two  of  her  servants  had  been  detailed  off  to 

L 


1 62  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

take  part  in  the  carriage  of  our  effects,  and  it  occurred  to 
this  buxom  dame  that  it  would  not  do  to  let  her  servants 
go  and  receive  money  on  their  own  account ;  so  she 
came  also,  and  carried  a  mere  nominal  burden,  having 
been  over  with  us  at  Shipki.  A  sentimental  and  per- 
fectly virtuous  friendship  had  sprung  up  between  this 
lady  and  my  Afghan  cook  ;  and  Chota  Khan's  admira- 
tion of  her  reached  the  culminating  point  when  he  saw 
his  fat  friend  cross  and  recross  the  jhiila  without  the 
least  hesitation  or  trepidation.  All  our  baggage  got 
across  safely,  which  cannot  be  calculated  upon  at  this 
particular  bridge,  and  nobody  fell  through,  though  such 
a  result  did  not  appear  at  all  unlikely  from  the  rotten 
state  of  the  birch  ropes.  I  have  gone  over  worse  jhulas 
than  this  ;  but  it  was  my  first,  and  impressed  me  with  a 
feeling  that  the  fewer  we  met  with  on  our  way  the  better. 
Any  bridge,  however,  and  even  the  hair-like  bridge  of 
Chinavad  itself,  with  hell  flaming  beneath,  would  have 
been  welcome  to  me  at  this  time,  so  long  as  it  took  me 
across  the  Sutlej,  and  away  from  its  furnace-like  valley. 
I  experienced  an  intense  feeling  of  relief  on  finding 
that  I  had  no  more  Sutlej,  but  only  the  long  line  of 
the  Western  Himaliya  before  me.  It  may  appear  very 
absurd  to  hate  a  river,  and  regard  it  as  a  personal 
enemy  and  special  agent  of  the  powers  of  evil ;  but  that 
was  the  frame  of  mind  into  which  I  had  got  as  regards 
this  stream.  "Go  to,"  I  said,  "you  uneasy,  yellowish- 
white,  foaming,  thundering  river.  Go  and  choke  your- 
self in  the  sands  of  the  Panjab.  You  may  be  called 
Langchhcnkliabad,  and  be  fed  by  the  mouths  of  elephants 
or  demons;  you  may  be  richly  laden  with  gold-dust, 
and  may  worm  your  way  into  the  bowels  of  the  earth, 
until,  in  sunless  caverns,  you  pollute  the  waters  of  Alph, 
the"  sacred  river:  but  you  shall  have  none  of  my  dust  to 
grind  against  the  walls  of  your  rock-prison." 


HANGRANG,  SPITT,  AND  POLYANDRY.  163 

In  order  to  reach  Nako,  where  Mr  Pagell  was  to  part 
from  me,  we  had  to  cross  L10  Porgyul  at  a  height  of 
about  14,000  feet,  the  lower  path  having  become  im- 
passable; but  that  could  not  be  done  in  a  day,  so  we 
camped  at  a  very  charming  spot  called  Gyumur,  on  the 
Sutlej  side  of  the  great  mountain,  at  the  height  of  about 
11,500  feet.  This  was  a  place  corresponding  to  Namgea 
and  Shipki  Rizhing,  having  a  few  terraced  fields,  and 
also  a  few  huts ;  but  it  was  more  level  than  these  other 
outlying  stations,  and  had  willow-trees  with  rills  of  pure 
water  running  through  meads  of  soft,  thick,  green  grass. 
A  spot  like  this  has  a  peculiar  charm  after  days  of 
barren  rock,  and  it  was  all  the  more  pleasant  because 
L10  Porgyul  shaded  the  sun  from  off  us  by  3  P.M.,  and 
left  a  long,  cool,  pleasant  afternoon.  Mr  Pagell's  con- 
vert, whose  father  had  been  hereditary  executioner  at 
Kunawar,  came  out  very  great  on  this  occasion.  All 
along  he  had  shown  a  disposition  to  talk  without 
measure,  and  without  much  regard  as  to  whether  any 
one  was  listening  to  him  or  not.  It  seemed  as  if  having 
been  denied  the  privilege  of  cutting  off  human  heads, 
and  so  stopping  human  breath,  he  had  a  special  claim 
to  use  his  own  throat  and  his  own  breath  to  an  un- 
limited extent.  Mr  Pagell,  with  his  kind  and  philo- 
sophical view  of  human  frailty,  excused  his  follower  on 
the  ground  that  it  was  the  man's  nature  so  to  act  ;  and 
clearly  it  was  so.  If  the  hereditary  executioner  had 
somewhat  restrained  his  conversational  powers  at  Shipki, 
as  a  place  where  there  was  some  danger  of  conversa- 
tion being  cut  short  by  the  removal  of  the  conversing 
head,  he  fully  made  up  for  the  deprivation  at  Gyumur. 
He  talked,  without  ceasing,  to  his  Moravian  brother  and 
to  me,  to  my  servants,  to  the  Namgea  bigarrics,  to  the 
willow-trees,  to  the  rills,  to  the  huts,  and  to  the  stones. 
It  did  not  in  the  least  matter  that  no  one  understood 


164  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


much  of  wh^t  he  said,  for  his  dialect  of  Lower  Kuna- 
war  was  not  rendered  more  intelligible  to  the  people 
about  him  by  the  mispronounced  Tibetan  words  which 
he  mixed  up  with  it  out  of  his  bronchial  tubes.  That 
was  a  matter  of  no  consequence  to  the  hereditary  execu- 
tioner, who  talked  without  waiting  for  replies,  and  did 
us  excellent  service  all  the  while  ;  but  I  could  not  help 
thinking  that  a  few  days  more  of  him  might  have  pro- 
duced a  strong  temptation  to  exercise  his  own  heredi- 
tary art  upon  his  own  person. 

Close  to  Gyumur  there  is  the  monastery  of  Tashi- 
gong,  which  affords  a  very  secluded  position  for  Lamas 
of  a  retiring  and  contemplative  turn  of  mind,  as  all 
Lamas  ought  to  be.  We  were  indebted  to  them  for 
yaks,  or  rather  zo-pos,  but  had  hardly  any  communi- 
cation with  them,  and  they  did  not  seem  disposed  to 
cultivate  our  acquaintance.  They  have  a  beautifully 
secluded  position  for  a  monastery,  among  the  precipices 
of  a  mountain  which  no  one  dreams  of  ascending,  and 
away  from  villages  and  trade-routes..  This  tendency  of 
Budhists  to  seclude  themselves  from  the  world  has 
interfered  with  Budhism  being  a  great  power  in  the 
world.  Even  in  China,  where  the  numerous  and  well- 
built  monasteries,  with  large  gardens  and  plantations 
attached,  sufficiently  prove  that  Budhism  must,  at  one 
time,  have  had  a  great  attraction  for  the  black-haired 
race,  this  religion  has  long  ceased  to  be  an  important 
element  in  the  national  life.  It  is  forced  to  give  way 
even  before  such  a  religion  as  Hinduism,  and  a  nega- 
tive positivism  such  as  Confucianism,  whenever  mankind 
reaches  a  certain  stage  of  complicated  social  arrange- 
ments, or,  as  we  call  it,  civilisation  ;  but  there  is  a  stage 
before  that,  though  after  the  period  of  tribal  fighting, 
when  a  religion  like  Budhism  naturally  flourishes.  Now 
Tibet  is  still  in  that  position  at  the  present  day,  and  so 


HANGRANG,  SPIT/,  AND  POLYANDRY.  165 

Budhism  (in  the  shape  of  Lamaism)  is  still  supreme  in 
it,  though  it  has  almost  entirely  disappeared  from  India, 
and  has  so  little  power  in  China. 

Starting  about  four  in  the  morning,  as  was  our  wont, 
we  had  a  very  pleasant  journey  over  the  mountain  to 
Nako.  There  were  some  vestiges  of  a  path.  The  ascent 
was  so  steep,  that  great  part  of  the  way  it  looked  as  if 
the  mountains  were  overhanging  us,  and  some  small 
stone  avalanches  came  down  uncomfortably  near ;  but 
that  was  the  character  only  of  the  first  section.  On 
reaching  the  highest  part  of  the  mountain  which  we 
attained — a  height  of  nearly  14,000  feet — we  found  our- 
selves on  the  turn  of  its  ridge,  and  wound  for  some  way 
along  the  top  of  terrific  precipices,  which  rose  up  almost 
perpendicularly  to  the  height  of  about  5000  feet  above 
the  river  Lee.  It  is  more  interesting,  and  a  great  deal 
more  pleasant,  being  at  the  top  of  this  gorge  than  at 
the  bottom  of  it,  where  there  is  no  path ;  and  the 
largest  pieces  of  rock  we  could  roll  over  were  dissipated 
into  fragments,  too  small  to  be  seen  by  us,  long  before  ■ 
they  reached  the  river. 

At  Nako  we  camped  close  to  the  village,  on  the 
grassy  bank  of  a  small  lake.  The  other  side  of  this 
lake  was  lined  with  large  poplar  and  willow  trees,  and 
in  so  desolate  a  region  the  place  appeared  exceedingly 
beautiful.  Elsewhere  it  might  not  have  appeared  so 
striking  ;  but  there  is  nothing  like  slow  difficult  travel- 
ling and  tent-life  or  camping  out  for  enabling  one  to 
appreciate  the  scenery.  I  particularly  felt  this  to  be 
the  case  in  the  upper  parts  of  Kashmir,  where  not  only 
the  scene  of  each  night's  encampment,  but  even  every 
turn  of  the  beautiful  wooded  valleys,  was  deeply  im- 
pressed upon  my  memory.  Nako  is  a  little  over  12,000 
feet  high  ;  and  though  I  had  already  slept  at  higher 
altitudes  on  the  Kung-ma  Pass,  the  weather  had  become 


166  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

colder,  and  I  here,  for  the  first  time,  experienced  a  sen- 
sation which  the  head  of  the  Yarkund  expedition  had 
warned  me  not  to  be  afraid  of.  It  consisted  in  being 
suddenly  awakened  at  night  by  an  overpowering  feeling 
of  suffocation  and  faintness,  which  one  unaccustomed  to 
it,  or  not  warned  about  it,  might  readily  mistake  for  the 
immediate  approach  of  death.  It  is  a  very  curious 
feeling — just  as  if  the  spirit  were  about  to  flit  from  the 
body  ;  but  a  few  more  days  of  travelling  along  the  line 
of  12,000  feet  enabled  me  to  get  rid  of  it  altogether. 

At  Nako  we  stayed  two  nights,  and  must  have  been 
in  much  need  of  a  rest,  for  we  enjoyed  our  stay  there 
immensely  in  spite  of  the  exceedingly  inclement  weather. 
It  is  in  an  almost  rainless  district,  but  it  is  occasionally 
visited  by  rain  or  snqw,  and  we  happened  to  hit  on  the 
time  of  one  of  these  storms.  Soon  after  our  arrival 
about  mid-day  the  thermometer  sank  to  50°,  and  the 
next  morning  was  at  470,  and  rain  fell,  or  chill  raw  mists 
swept  over  us.  Occasionally  the  clouds  would  clear 
away,  showing  the  mountain  above  us  white  with  new- 
fallen  snow  down  to  within  a  few  hundred  feet  of  our 
tent ;  and^  this  sort  of  weather  continued  during  the 
period  of  our  stay  at  this  highly  elevated  village.  At 
night  it  was  intensely  cold  ;  the  wind  carried  the  rain 
into  our  frail  abodes  wherever  it  could  find  admission  ; 
and  though  the  canvas  of  our  tents  did  not  admit  the 
wet  exactly,  yet  it  was  in  a  very  damp  state,  which 
added  to  the  coolness  of  the  interior.  Nevertheless  we 
felt  quite  at  home,  and  our  servants  also  enjoyed  them- 
selves much.  They  amused  themselves  with  various 
athletic  games  ;  and,  to  my  astonishment,  I  found  Silas, 
who  had  spent  all  his  life  within  the  tropics,  swimming 
across  the  lake,  which  was  a  most  dangerous  thing  to  do, 
owing  to  the  almost  icy  coldness  of  the  water  and  the 
number  of  tangled  weeds  which  it  contained.     This,  and 


HANGRANG,  SPITI,  AND  POLYANDRY.  167 

our  general  cheerfulness,  said  a  great  deal  for  the  bene- 
ficial effects  of  high  mountain  air,  and  of  a  nourishing 
diet  of  milk,  mutton,  game,  and  wheat  or  barley  flour, 
so  superior  to  the  rice,  curries,  vegetables,  and  pulse, 
with  which  the  people  of  India  delight  to  stuff  them- 
selves. The  piles  of  cJuippatties,  or  girdle-cakes,  which 
my  servants  baked  for  themselves,  were  enormous  ;  so 
were  their  draughts  of  milk  ;  and  I  supplied  them  with  a 
great  deal  of  mutton,  which  they  did  not  undervalue. 
The  people  of  all  the  Tibetan-speaking  countries  also 
eat  enormously.  They  always  had  something  before 
starting,  however  early  the  hour  might  be  ;  and  when- 
ever we  halted  for  a  little  on  the  way,  they  took  out 
their  suttu,  or  roasted  barley  flour,  and  if  there  happened 
to  be  any  water  accessible,  kneaded  this  flour  into  large 
balls  about  the  size  of  a  cricket-ball,  and  so  ate  it  with 
great  gusto.  On  halting  for  the  day,  which  was  most 
usually  about  three  in  the  afternoon,  while  the  men 
assisted  us  in  pitching  the  tents  and  making  other 
arrangements,  the  women  immediately  fell  to  work  in 
making  cJmppattics  and  preparing  great  pots  of  tea-broth, 
into  which  they  put  salt,  butter,  flour,  sometimes  even 
meat,  and,  in  fact,  almost  anything  eatable  which  turned 
up.  After  they  had  done  with  us,  the  whole  of  their 
afternoons  and  evenings  appeared  to  be  spent  in  eating 
and  supping,  varied  occasionally  by  singing  or  a  wild 
dance.  Sometimes  they  prolonged  their  feasting  late 
into  the  night  ;  and  it  was  a  mystery  to  me  where  all 
the  flesh  they  consumed  came  from,  until  I  observed 
that  the  Himaliya  are  very  rich  in  the  carcasses  of  sheep 
and  goats  which  have  been  killed  by  exposure  or  by 
falling  rocks.  All  this  eating  enables  the  Tibetans  to 
carry  enormous  burdens,  and  to  make  long  marches  up 
and  down  their  terrible  mountains.  Among  the  rice- 
eating  Kashmirians  I  observed  that  large-bodied,  strong 


168  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

enough  looking  young  men  were  grievously  oppressed, 
and  soon  knocked  up,  by  burdens  which  Tibetan  women 
could  have  carried  gaily  along  far  more  difficult  paths, 
and  which  their  husbands  would  have  thought  nothing: 
of.  But  even  in  Tibet  the  heaviest  burden  did  not 
always  go  to  the  strongest  bearer.  A  very  common  way 
was  for  my  bigarries  to  engage  in  a  game  of  chance  the 
night  before  starting,  and  so  settle  the  order  of  selecting 
packages.  Occasionally  the  strongest  men  used  their 
strength  in  order  to  reserve  for  themselves  the  lightest 
burdens.  I  noticed  also,  as  an  invariable  rule,  that  the 
worst  carriers,  those  who  had  the  most  need  of  husband- 
ing their  breath,  were  always  the  most  talkative  and 
querulous,  while  the  best  were  either  silent  or  indulged 
only  in  brief  occasional  exclamations. 

The  houses  I  had  met  with  hitherto  had  all  slated 
roofs  ;  but  at  Nako,  as  all  through  Spiti,  and  also  in 
Zanskar,  thorn  bushes  were  thickly  piled  on  the  roofs, 
and  iii  some  cases  actually  constituted  the  only  roofs 
there  were  except  beams.  This  is  done  to  preserve  the 
wood  below,  and  it  probably  does,  from  the  effects  of 
the  sun  in  so  dry  a  climate  ;  it  must  also  assist  in  keep- 
ing out  the  cold  ;  but  it  gives  the  houses  a  peculiar  furzy 
look,  and  denies  the  people  the  great  privilege  of  using 
the  top  of  the  house  beneath  their  own  as  an  addendum 
to  their  own  abode.  I  purchased  at  this  village  a  pretty 
large  shaggy  white  dog,  of  a  breed  which  is  common  all 
over  China.  We  called  it  Nako,  or  the  Nako-wallah, 
after  the  place  of  its  birth  ;  and  never  did  poor  animal 
show  such  attachment  to  its  native  village.  It  could 
only  be  managed  for  some  days  by  a  long  stick  which 
was  fastened  to  its  collar,  as  it  did  not  do  to  let  it  come 
into  close  contact  with  us  because  of  its  teeth.  In  this 
vile  durance,  and  even  after  it  had  got  accustomed  to 
us,  and  could  be  led  by  a  chain,  it  was  continually  sigh- 


HANGRANG,  SPIT/,  AND  POLYANDRY.  169 

ing,  whining,  howling,  growling,  and  looking  piteously 
in  the  direction  in  which  it  supposed  its  birthplace  to 
be.  Even  when  we  were  hundreds  of  miles  away  from 
Nako,  it  no  sooner  found  its  chain  loose  than  it  immedi- 
ately turned  on  its  footsteps  and  made  along  the  path 
we  had  just  traversed,  being  apparently  under  the  im- 
pression that  it  was  only  a  day's  journey  from  its  be- 
loved village.  It  had  the  utmost  dread  of  running  water, 
and  had  to  be  carried  or  forced  across  all  bridges  and 
fords.  No  dog,  of  whatever  size,  could  stand  against  it 
in  fight,  for  our  Chinese  friend  had  peculiar  tactics  of  its 
own,  which  took  its  opponents  completely  by  surprise. 
When  it  saw  another  dog,  and  was  unchained,  it  imme- 
diately rushed  straight  at  the  other  dog,  butted  it  over 
and  seized  it  by  the  throat  or  some  equally  tender  place 
before  the  enemy  could  gather  itself  together.  Yet 
Nako  became  a  most  affectionate  animal,  and  was  an 
admirable  watch.  It  never  uttered  a  sound  at  night 
when  any  stranger  came  near  it,  but  quietly  pinned  him 
by  the  calf  of  the  leg,  and  held  on  there  in  silence  until 
some  one  it  could  trust  came  to  the  relief.  The  Nako- 
wallah  was  a  most  curious  mixture  of  simplicity,  fero- 
city, and  affectionateness.  I  left  him  with  a  lady  at 
Peshawar,  to  whose  little  girls  he  took  at  once,  in  a 
gentle  and  playful  manner  ;  but  when  I  said  "Good-bye, 
Nako,"  he  divined  at  once  that  I  was  going  to  desert 
him  ;  he  leaped  on  his  chain  and  howled  and  wailed.  I 
should  not  at  all  wonder  if  a  cood  manv  dogs  were  to 
be  met  with  in  heaven,  while  as  many  human  beings 
were  made  to  reappear  as  pariahs  on  the  plains  of 
India. 

Above  Nako  there  is  a  small  Lama  monastery,  and 

all  the  way  up  to  it — a  height  of  about  600  feet — there 

)are  terraced  fields  in  which  are  grown  wheat,  barley,  a 

j    kind    of  turnip,  and  pulse.     Thus  the  cultivation  rises 


170  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO IV. 

here  to  almost  I  3,000  feet,  and  the  crops  are  said  to  be 
very  good  indeed.  There  is  some  nearly  level  pasture- 
ground  about  the  place,  and  yaks  and  ponies  are  bred 
in  it  for  the  trade  into  Chinese  Tibet.  The  people  are 
all  Tibetans,  and  distinctly  Tartar  in  feature.  They  are 
called  Dukpas,  and  seem  to  be  of  rather  a  religious  turn. 
Accordingly,  they  had  recently  been  favoured  by  the  re- 
incarnation, in  a  boy  of  their  village,  of  the  Teshu  Lama, 
who  resides  at  Teshu  Lambu,  the  capital  of  Western 
Tibet,  and  who,  in  the  Lama  hierarchy,  is  second  only 
to  the  Dalai  or  Grand  Lama. 

At  Nako  I  bade  farewell  to  my  kind  friend  Mr  Pagell, 
to  whom  I  had  been  so  much  indebted.  On  all  the  rest 
of  my  journey  I  was  accompanied  only  by  my  native 
servants  and  by  porters  of  the  country,  and  only  twice, 
shortly  after  parting  with  the  Moravian,  did  I  meet 
European  travellers.  These  were  two  Indian  officers 
who  were  crossing  from  Ladak  to  the  Sutlej  valley;  and 
another  officer,  a  captain  from  Gwalior,  who  had  gone 
into  Spiti  by  the  Babah  route,  and  whom  I  passed  a 
few  hours  after  parting  with  Mr  Pagell.  My  first  day's 
journey  to  Chango  was  easy,  over  tolerably  level  ground, 
which  seldom  required  me  to  dismount  from  my  zo-po, 
and  on  a  gentle  level,  descending  about  2000  feet  to 
Chango.  That  place  has  a  large  extent  of  cultivated 
nearly  level  ground,  and  it  may  be  called  the  capital  of 
Hangrang,  a  province  which  formerly  belonged  to  China, 
and  of  which  the  other  large  villages  are  Nako,  Hango, 
and  Lfo.  The  whole  population  of  this  little  province 
numbers  only  about  3000  souls,  and  they  seem  to  be 
terribly  hard  worked  in  autumn  ;  but  then  during  long 
months  of  the  year  they  have  little  to  do  except  to 
enjoy  themselves.  In  the  afternoon  two  bands  of  wan- 
dering Spiti  minstrels  made  their  appearance,  and  per- 
formed before  my  tent.     The  attraction  of  the  larger  of 


HANGRANG,  SPJTT,  AND  POLYANDRY.  171 

them  was  a  handsome  woman  (two  of  whose  husbands 
were  among  the  minstrels — there  being  more  at  home), 
who  danced  and  sang  after  the  manner  of  Indian  nautch 
girls,  but  with  more  vigour  and  less  impropriety.  The 
senior  husband  of  this  lady  ingeniously  remarked  that  I 
could  not  think  of  giving  him  less  than  a  rupee,  as  he 
was  going  to  sing  my  praise  over  the  whole  country- 
side. 

On  the  next  two  days  I  had  the  first  and  shortest  of 
those  stretches  over  ground  without  villages  and  houses 
to  which  I  have  already  alluded;  and  my  route  took  me 
again,  for  a  day's  journey  and  a  night's  encampment, 
into  the  inhospitable  region  of  Chinese  Tibet,  but  into  a 
section  of  that  country  where  I  saw  no  Tartar  young 
women  or  human  inhabitants  of  any  kind.  From 
Chango  a  path  leads  into  Spiti  across  the  river  Lee,  by 
the  fort  of  Shealkar,  over  the  Lepcha  Pass  and  along 
the  right  bank  of  the  Lee  ;  but  that  route  is  said  to  be 
extremely  difficult,  and  I  selected  a  path  (which  surely 
cannot  possibly  be  much  better)  that  takes  northward 
up  the  left  side  of  the  Lee,  but  at  some  distance  from  it, 
into  the  Chinese  province  of  Chumurti,  and,  after  a  day's 
journey  there,  crosses  the  boundary  of  Spiti,  and  con- 
tinues, still  on  the  same  bank  of  the  river,  on  to  Dankar, 
the  capital  of  Spiti.  , 

A  long  steep  ascent  from  Chango  took  me  again  on 
to  the  priceless  12,000  and  13,000  feet  level.  The  early 
morning  was  most  delicious,  being  clear  and  bright, 
without  wind,  and  exhilarating  in  the  highest  degree, 
while  nothing  could  be  more  striking  than  the  lighting 
up  by  the  sun  of  the  snowy  peaks  around.  One  starts 
on  these  early  mountain  journeys  in  great  spirits,  after 
drinking  about  a  quart  of  fresh  milk  ;  but  after  three 
or  four  hours,  when  the  rays  of  the  sun  have  begun  to 
make   themselves   felt,   and   there    has    been    a    certain 


7  72  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

amount  of  going  down  into  perpendicular  gorges  and 
climbing  painfully  up  the  other  side  of  them,  our  spirits 
begin  to  flag,  and  unless  there  has  been  a  long  rest  and 
a  good  breakfast  in  the  middle  of  the  day,  feelings  of 
exasperation  are  in  the  ascendant  before  the  camping- 
ground  is  reached.  Early  on  this  day's  journey,  I  met 
the  finest  Tibetan  mastiff  which  I  saw  in  all  the  Hima- 
liya.  It  was  a  sheep-dog,  of  a  dark  colour,  and  much 
longer  and  larger  than  any  of  the  ferocious  guardians  of 
Shipki.  While  we  were  talking  to  the  shepherd  who 
owned  it,  this  magnificent  creature  sat  watching  us, 
growling  and  showing  his  teeth,  evidently  ready  to  fly 
at  our  throats  at  a  moment's  notice;  but  whenever  I 
spoke  of  purchase,  it  at  once  put  a  mile  of  hill  between 
us,  and  no  calls  of  its  master  would  induce  it  to  come 
back.  It  seemed  at  once  to  understand  that  it  was 
being  bargained  for,  and  so  took  steps  to  preserve  its 
own  liberty  ;  but  it  need  not  have  been  so  alarmed,  for 
the  shepherd  refused  to  part  with  it  on  any  terms. 

After  passing  the  Chaddaldok  Po  by  a  narrow  slated 
wooden  bridge,  we  reached  the  top  of  the  left  bank  of 
the  To-tzo  or  Para  river,  which  divides  Hangiang  from 
Chinese  Tibet.  The  descent  to  the  stream  is  about 
1500  feet,  and  a  short  way  down  there  are  some  hot 
springs,  with  grass  and  willow-trees  round  them,  and 
the  shelter  of  great  rocks.  This  would  be  by  far  the 
best  place  for  camping ;  but,  for  some  reason  or  other, 
the  Chango  people  had  determined  that  we  should  do 
so  on  the  Chinese  side  of  the  river.  On  getting  down 
there,  with  some  difficulty,  and  crossing  the  saiigpa,  I 
found  there  was  no  protection  whatever  from  the  sun's 
rays,  which  beat  into  the  valley  fiercely,  and  were  re- 
flected, in  an  overpowering  manner,  from  the  white 
stones  and  rocks  around,  while  the  noise  of  the  furious 
river  was  quite  deafening.     Here  I  had  to  remain  with- 


HANGRANG,  SPITI,  AND  POLYANDRY.  173 

out  shelter  and  without  food  for  nearly  three  hours, 
getting  more  and  more  exasperated  as  time  passed  on. 
After  this,  I  usually  kept  two  coolies  within  reach  of 
me,  with  sufficient  supplies-to  meet  any  emergency,  and 
clothing  sufficient  to  enable  me  to  camp  out  if  necessary; 
but  I  had  now  to  learn  the  wisdom  of  such  an  arrange- 
ment. My  servants  had  not  got  on  well  with  the  Chan- 
go  people,  and  the  latter  had  left  us  only  a  little  way 
before  we  reached  this  river,  under  pretence  of  taking  a 
short  cut.  I  could  not  feel  that  the  former  were  pro- 
perly in  my  hands  until  I  got  past  Dankar,  -for  they 
might  invent  some  scheme  for  forcing  me  to  go  down 
from  that  place  to  the  Sutlej  valley,  through  the  Babah 
Pass.  As  to  the  Chango  bigarrics,  I  could  not  say  what 
their  motive  might  be  for  delay ;  but  it  was  clear  to  me, 
now  that  I  was  alone,  that  it  would  be  necessary  to 
check  this  sort  of  thing  at  the  outset,  and  I  felt  a  certain 
advantage  for  doing  so  in  being  upon  Chinese  ground. 
So,  when  the  parties  did  come  in  at  last,  I  made  my 
wrath  appear  to  be  even  greater  than  it  was  ;  and,  see- 
ing that  one  of  them  was  a  shikar,  and  had  a  matchlock 
gun  and  a  hunting-knife  with  him,  I  thought  there  could 
be  nothing  cowardly  in  making  an  example  of  him,  so  I 
fell  upon  him,  and  frightened  one  or  two  more.  This 
was  what  the  French  call  a  necessary  act,  and  it  by  no 
means  interfered  with  the  friendly  terms  on  which  I 
always  stood  with  my  coolies ;  but  I  need  scarcely  say 
that  such  things  should  not  be  encouraged,  and  that 
everything  depends  upon  why  and  how  they  are  done. 
No  formal  rules  can  touch  this  subject  effectually. 
Some  men  will  travel  through  a  country  without  being 
guilty  of  an  act  of  violence,  or  even  of  uttering  an  angry 
word,  and  yet  they  leave  behind  a  feeling  of  bitter  hatred, 
not  only  towards  themselves,  but  also  towards  the  race 
and  Government  to  which  they  belong.     Other  men  pro- 


174  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

duce  similar  results  by  unnecessary,  stupid,  and  cowardly 
acts  of  violence.  It  is  curious  that  sometimes  a  Briton, 
who  is  so  wildly  benevolent  in  theory  towards  weak  and 
uncivilised  races,  no  sooner  finds  himself  among  them 
than  he  tramples  on  their  toes  unmercifully,  and  is 
ready  to  treat  them  in  a  ruthless  manner.  Therefore  I 
must  guard  against  the  supposition  that  I  go  in  for  vio- 
lent treatment  in  any  part  of  the  world,  though  just  as 
little  do  I  hold  that  it  should  be  entirely  avoided  in  all 
circumstances.  It  is  the  touch  of  nature  that  makes  the 
whole  world  kin  which  is  the  best  recommendation  of 
the  traveller.  An  English  officer,  a  great  sJiikar,  writ- 
ing to  me  from  the  wilds  to  the  north  of  Kashmir,  men- 
tions that  the  people  of  one  village  (who  had  been  in 
Kashmir,  and  had  noticed  the  ways  of  English  officers 
there)  begged  him,  in  the  name  of  God,  not  to  make  a 
map  of  the  country  ;  and  on  his  asking  them  the  reason 
why,  their  reply  was,  "  We  do  not  mind  you  coming 
here,  because  you  talk  to  us  and  let  us  sit  down  by  you ; 

but   other   officers   will    say  to    us,    '  D n    you,    go 

away.'"  This  often  arises  simply  from  fatigue;  but 
for  a  traveller  to  neglect  to  make  friends  of  the  people 
among  whom  he  sojourns,  causes  far  more  dislike  to 
him  than  any  positive  acts  of  violence  he  is  likely  to 
commit  ;  and  such  is  specially  the  case  in  high  moun- 
tainous countries,  where  the  population  is  scanty  and 
travellers  rare,  and  the  people — however  poor  some  of 
them  may  be,  and  however  dirty  all  are — have  much 
natural  though  not  formal  politeness,  and  are  free  from 
the  rude  presumption  which  has  become  one  of  the  dis- 
tinguishing characteristics  of  the  lower  classes  of  this 
country  of  late  years.  Englishmen  are  far  from  being 
the  most  unconciliatory  of  travellers,  and  they  would 
be  better  liked  in  India  if  the  Indians  had  more 
experience  of  the  harshness  of  the  ordinary  German, 


NANGRANG,  SPITI,  AND  POLYANDRY.  175 


and    the    ignorant    insolence    of    the    ordinary    French 
traveller. 

At    this    point    I   finally    left    the   dominions   of  the 
Rajah  of  Bussahir,  which  include  upper  and  lower  Ku- 
nawar  and  the  Tartar  province  of  Hangrang.     Every- 
where there,  except  to  a  slight  extent  at  Chango,  the 
people  had   been  exceedingly   civil   and  pleasant,   and 
had   readily  furnished   me   with   all   the   carriage   I    re- 
quired, though  they  must  often  have  done  so  at  great 
inconvenience    to    themselves,    owing    to    the    harvest 
operations  which  were  going  on.     In    lower   Kunawar 
they  seemed  to  be  a  gentle  and   rather  timid  people, 
speaking  an  Aryan  language  ;  and  though  the  Tartars 
of  the  upper  portion  of  Bussahir  were  of  rougher  and 
stronger  character,   yet   they  were   quiet   and    friendly 
enough.     As  to  the  roads  of  these  provinces,  they  are 
exactly   in  the   same   state   as  when    Gerard   traversed 
them,  and  I  prefer  to  quote  here  his  account  of  them 
rather  than  to  give  any  more  descriptions  of  my  own. 
"  The   roads   in  general, "  he   says,  "  consist  of  narrow 
footpaths  skirting  precipices,  with  often  here  and  there 
rocks,  that  would  seem  to  come  down  with  a  puff  of 
wind,   projecting  over  the   head  ;   to   avoid  which   it  is 
necessary  sometimes  to  bend  yourself  double.     The  way 
often   leads  over  smooth  stones   steeply   inclined   to  a 
frightful  abyss,  with  small    niches   cut  or  worn,  barely 
sufficient  to  admit  the  point  of  the  foot ;  or  it  lies  upon 
heaps  of  gigantic  angular  fragments  of  granite  or  gneiss, 
almost  piercing  the  shoes,  and  piled  upon  one  another 
in  the  most  horrid  disorder.     Where  the  rocks  are  con- 
stantly hurled  from  above  there  is  not  the  slightest  trace 
of  a  path,  and  cairns  of  stones  are  erected  within  sight  of 
each  othet*  to  guide  the  traveller.     There  are  often  deep 
chasms  between  the  rocks,  and  it  requires  a  considerable 
degree  of  agility  to  clear  them,  and  no  small  degree  of 


176  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

caution  to  avoid  overturning  the  stones,  which  now  and 
then  shake  under  you.  .  .  .  The  most  difficult  part  I 
saw  was  where  ropes  were  used  to  raise  and  lower  the 
baggage  ;  and  this  did  not  arise  from  the  path  having 
given  way.  Now  and  then  flights  of  stone  steps  occut, 
notched  trees  and  spars  from  rock  to  rock,  rude  scaffold- 
ing along  the  perpendicular  face  of  a  mountain,  formed 
of  horizontal  stakes  driven  into  the  crevices,  with  boards 
above,  and  the  outer  ends  resting  on  trees  or  slanting 
posts  projecting  from  the  clefts  of  the  rock  below.  The 
most  extraordinary  one  of  this  kind  I  ever  saw  was  in 
the  valley  of  Teedong.  It  is  called  Rapua,  and  the 
scaffolding  continued  for  150  feet.  It  was  constructed 
like  the  other,  with  this  difference,  that  six  posts  were 
driven  horizontally  into  the  cracks  of  the  rocks,  and 
secured  by  a  great  many  wedges;  there  was  no  support 
on  the  outer  side,  and  the  river,  which  undermined  it, 
rushed  with  incredible  fury  and  a  clamorous  uproar 
beneath.  The  shaking  of  the  scaffolding,  together  with 
the  stupefying  noise  of  the  torrent,  combined  to  give  the 
traveller  an  uncertain  idea  of  his  safety."  *  To  this  it 
may  be  added,  that  though  several  bridges — sangpas 
such  as  the  one  beneath  Pu,  which  I  have  already  de- 
scribed— have  been  built  of  late  in  Kunawar,  almost 
every  path  of  that  province  is  crossed  by  unbridged 
mountain  torrents,  which  are  by  no  means  easy  to  pass 
in  summer  during  the  day,  when  they  are  swollen  by 
the  melting  snows  and  glaciers  above.  Bungalows  for 
Europeans  are  to  be  found  only  on  the  Hindusthan 
and  Tibet  road  ;  and  as  the  people,  being  affected  by 
Hindu  caste  notions,  will  not  allow  a  European  to  oc- 
cupy their  houses,  a  tent  is  necessary  for  making  much 

*  "Account  of  Koonawur,"  &c,  &c,  by  the  late  Capt.  Alexander  Gerard. 
Edited  by  George  Lloyd      London,  1841. 


HANGRANG,  SPIT/,  AND  POLYANDRY.  177 

acquaintance  with  this  most  mountainous  and  formid- 
able country. 

Camped  as  we  were  on  the  Chinese  side  of  the  To-tzo 
river,  we  might  have  had  a  marauding  visit  from  some 
of  the  nomad  Tartars,  dwellers  in  tents,  who  are  the 
chief  inhabitants  of  the  province  of  Chumurti ;  but,  I 
fancy,  the  Lassa  Government  would  be  as  opposed  to 
any  unnecessary  interference  with  Englishmen  as  it  is 
to  admitting  them  into  Chinese  Tibet,  because  such  in- 
terference might  be  made  a  handle  of  by  the  Indian 
Government.  There  is  another  door  here  at  To-tzo  into 
the  dominions  of  the  Grand  Lama;  but  Mr  Pagell  had 
told  me  that  he  had  already  tried  it,  and  that  on  reach- 
ing the  first  village,  he  was  sent  back  immediately,  with- 
out any  ceremony,  and  was  scarcely  allowed  time  to 
feed  his  yak  or  pony.  It  would,  no  doubt,  be  as  diffi- 
cult to  communicate  with  the  Tzong-pon  of  Chumurti 
as  with  the  Tzong-pon  of  D'zabrung,  and  the  Change* 
people  wouki  only  go  along  the  path  to  Spiti.  Since 
penning  my  former  remarks  on  the  exclusiveness  of 
the  Tibetans,  I  have  noticed  that  Turner*  makes  men- 
tion of  a  very  probable  origin  of  it.  He  ascribes  it  not 
to  any  dislike  to  Europeans,  but  to  "that  spirit  of  con- 
quest which  forms  the  common  character  of  all  Moham- 
medan states,  and  that  hostility  which  their  religion 
enjoins  against  all  who  are  not  its  professors."  He,  in- 
deed, refers  more  particularly  to  this  cause  as  having  led 
the  people  of  Bhotan  to  close  the  southern  entrances  to 
their  mountainous  country  ;  but  it  is  extremely  likely 
that  it  may  have  been  more  generally  operative,  and 
induced  the  Tibetans  to  seclude  the  whole  dominions  of 
the  Grand  Lama,  while  their  dread  of  Europeans  and 


*  "  An  Account   of  an  Embassy  to  the  Court  of  the  Teshoo  Lama,  in 
Tibet."     By  Captain  Samuel  Turner.     London,  1S06. 

M 


178  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

of  the  gold-mines  being  coveted,  might  still  have  acted 
afterwards  to  the  same  end.  In  the  close  of  last  cen- 
tury there  seems  to  have  been  no  unwillingness  on  the 
part  of  the  Lama  Government  to  enter  into  relationships 
with  British  India  ;  for  first  Mr  George  Bogle  in  1774, 
and  then  Captain  Turner  in  1783,  were  allowed  to  visit 
Teshu  Lambu  as  representatives  of  our  Government. 
A  paragraph  appeared  in  the  Times,  a  few  days  ago, 
intimating  that  Mr  Bogle's  MS.  journal  of  his  mission 
to  Lassa  had  been  discovered  lately  in  the  British 
Museum,  and  is  to  be  published  by  the  Indian  Govern- 
ment, along  with  an  account  of  the  trade-routes  into 
Tibet.  There  must  surely,  however,  be  some  mistake 
here  ;  because,  though  Turner  gives  some  account  of  his 
predecessor's  mission,  he  makes  no  mention  whatever  of 
Bogle  having  gone  to  Lassa,  but  only  to  Teshii  Lambu 
and  the  Bogda  Lama.  Turner's  own  journal  gives  a 
very  full  account  of  that  route  and  of  that  part  of 
the  country;  but  Mr  Bogle's  journal  will  be  welcome. 
Though,  it  contains  no  geographical  information,  yet  I 
am  informed  it  gives  long  reports  of  the  envoy's  conver- 
sations with  the  Tibetan  authorities ;  and  it  is  gratifying 
to  find  that  the  Indian  Government  is  again  turning  its 
thoughts  to  Chinese  Tibet  after  the  long  time  which  has 
elapsed  since  1783.  A  formal  mission  might  be  sent 
to  Lassa  ;  or,  under  the  treaty  of  Tien-tsin,  passports 
might  be  claimed  from  the  Chinese  Foreign  Office, 
allowing  Englishmen,  in  a  private  or  in  a  semi-official 
capacity,  to  traverse  Chinese  Tibet,  the  passports  being 
either  in  the  language  of  the  country  or  accompanied 
by  Tibetan  translations  given  under  imperial  authority. 
As  it  is,  the  do-nothing  policy  of  the  Indian  Govern- 
ment recoils  injuriously  upon  its  prestige  with  its  own 
subjects.  It  hurts  our  position  in  India  for  the  people 
there  to  know  that  there  is  a  country  adjoining  our  own 


HANGRANG,  SPIT/,  AND  POLYANDRY.  179 

territory  into  which  Englishmen  are  systematically  re- 
fused entrance,  while  the  nations  of  British  India  and  of 
its  tributary  states  are  allowed  to  enter  freely,  and  even 
to  settle  in  large  numbers  at  the  capital,  Lassa,*  as  the 
Kashmiris  do.  About  a  year  and  a  half  ago  the  Cal- 
cutta Chamber  of  Commerce  addressed  the  Viceroy 
and  the  Secretary  of  State  for  India,  complaining  of  the 
restrictions  there  were  in  the  way  of  commerce  with 
Tibet,  and  received  answers  which  seemed  to  imply  that 
their  prayer  would  be  taken  into  favourable  considera- 
tion whenever  circumstances  would  allow.  More  re- 
cently the  Friend  of  India  well  remarked  that  "  the 
day  has  now  come  when  we  may  justly  ask  the  Chinese 
Emperor  to  take  steps  for  our  admittance  into  Tibet." 
Certainly  the  matter  might  well  be  brought  to  a  crisis 
now;  and  there  would  not  have  been  the  least  difficulty 
about  it  if  a  more  active  use  had  been  made,  within  the 
last  few  years,  of  our  position  in  China. 

The  path  to  Lari,  the  first  village  in  Spiti,  where  wre 
camped  under  a  solitary  apricot-tree,  said  to  be  the  only 
tree  of  the  kind  in  the  whole  province,  was  very  fatiguing, 
because  large  portions  of  it  could  not  be  ridden  over; 
and  there  were  some  ticklish  faces  of  smooth,  sloping 
rock  to  be  crossed,  which  a  yak  could  hardly  have  got 
over,  but  which  were  managed,  when  riderless,  in  a  won- 
derful manner  by  the  shoeless  ghiiut,  or  mountain  pony, 
which  I  had  got  at  Chango.  The  scenery  was  wild  and 
desolate  rather  than  striking — no  house,  no  tree,  and 
hardly  even  a  bush  being  visible.  There  was  a  great 
deal  of  limestone-rock  on  this  journey  ;  and  at  some 
places  it  was  of  such  a  character  that  it  might  be  called 


*  In  Western  Tibet  the  name  of  this  city  is  pronounced  without  an 
aspirate  ;  but  in  the  centre  and  east  of  the  country  it  is  called  "  Lhassa," 
which,  consequently,  is  the  correct  way. 


i8o  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

marble.  We  passed  several  open  caverns ;  and  in  one 
of  these,  about  a  third  of  the  way  from  the  To-tzo  river, 
I  stopped  for  breakfast.  It  was  a  magnificent  open 
arch,  about  fifty  feet  high  in  front,  and  as  many,  in 
breadth,  in  the  face  of  a  precipice,  and  afforded  cool 
shade  until  after  mid-day,  when  the  declining  sun  began 
to  beat  into  it.  But  the  Karitha  river,  which  occurs 
immediately  after,  ought  to  be  passed  in  the  morning, 
because  there  is  only  a  two-poled  bridge  over  it,  on 
which  even  a  gJuint  cannot  cross  ;  and  the  stream  was  so 
swollen  at  mid-day  by  the  melting  snow  that  my  pony 
was  nearly  lost. 

The  next  morning  I  was  delayed  at  Lari  by  the  infor- 
mation that  messengers  had  arrived  at  the  other  side  of 
the  river  with  a  letter  for  me  and  some  money,  but  were 
unable  to  cross  the  river,  aj/ui/a,  which  formerly  existed 
there,  having  given  way.  This  seemed  exceedingly  im- 
probable, but  I  went  down  to  inquire.  There  was  a 
double  rope  across  the  stream,  and  I  told  the  messengers 
to  fasten  the  letter  to  it,  and  so  send  that  across,  but  to 
keep  the  money  ;  and  I  found  that  both  were  for  the 
Gwalior  captain  whom  I  met  near  Nako,  so  I  ordered 
the  bearers  to  proceed  to  Pii  in  search  of  him.  Where 
there  is  no  bridge  exactly,  there  is  often  a  double  rope 
of  this  kind  across  the  deep-sunk  rivers  of  the  Himaliya, 
to  enable  the  villagers  on  opposite  sides  of  the  gorge  to 
communicate  with  each  other  ;  and  the  rope  is  some- 
times strong  enough  to  allow  of  a  man  being  slung  to  it, 
and  so  worked  across.  If  only  the  rope  be  sound,  which 
cannot  always  be  depended  on,  this  method  of  progres- 
sion is  preferable  to  the  j/iu/a,  because,  though  it  may 
try  the  nerves,  it  does  not  at  the  same  time  call  for  pain- 
ful exertion  which  disturbs  the  heart's  action. 

Po,  or  Poi,  my  next  camping-place,  was  a  very  plea- 
sant village,  with  little  streams  running  between  willow- 


HANGRANG,  SPITI,  AND  POLYANDRY.  1S1 

trees,  and  with  peaks  and  walls  of  snow  rising  over  the 
precipices,  and  immense  steep  slopes  of  shingle  imme- 
diately around.  Another  day  took  me  to  Dankar,  under 
immense  dark  precipices,  which  lined  both  banks  of  the 
river,  of  slate  and  shale.  It  would  be  well  for  a  prac- 
tical geologist  to  examine  that  part  of  the  Spiti  valley, 
and  also  the  portion  between  Po  and  Lari,  for  it  is  pos- 
sible they  may  contain  coal.  For  the  most  part,  the 
way  to  Dankar  was  tolerably  level  and  good  ;  but  the 
height  of  the  water  of  the  Lee  at  this  season  compelled 
us  to  make  a  difficult  detour  through  probably  the  most 
extraordinary  series  of  gorges  there  is  in  the  world. 
We  moved  along  a  dry  watercourse,  between  perpen- 
dicular tertiary  or  alluvial  strata,  rising  to  hundreds  and 
even  to  thousands  of  feet  above.  The  floor  of  these 
clefts  was  fifteen  or  twenty  feet  broad,  and  though  they 
must  have  enlarged  considerably  at  the  top,  they  ap- 
peared to  do  so  very  little  to  the  eye.  It  was  not  rock, 
but  soft  deposits  which  rose  on  both  sides  of  us ;  and 
though  there  had  been  every  irregularity  in  the  lateral 
effects  of  the  water,  which  had  cut  out  the  passages  in 
many  directions,  there  had  been  very  little  in  its  perpen- 
dicular action,  for,  in  that  respect,  the  water  had  cut 
almost  straight  down.  High  up,  at  the  edges  of  these 
extraordinary  ravines,  the  strata  had  been  worn  away  so 
as  to  form  towers,  spires,  turrets,  and  all  sorts  of  fan- 
tastic shapes,  which  could  be  seen  by  looking  up  the 
cross  passages  and  at  the  turnings.  Often  high  above, 
and  apparently  ready  to  fall  at  any  moment,  a  huge  rock 
was  supported  on  a  long  tower  or  spire  of  earth  and 
gravel,  which  (being  a  little  harder  than  the  strata 
around,  or  having  possibly  been  compressed  by  the 
weight  of  the  rock)  had  remained  standing,  while  the 
earth  round  it  had  crumbled  or  been  washed  away. 
These  threatening  phenomena  were  either  on  the  edge 


1 82  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

of  the  clefts  or  rose  up  from  their  sides,  and  were  very 
similar  to  the  rocks  which  are  to  be  seen  on  glaciers 
supported  on  pillars  of  ice.  The  way  was  most  tortuous, 
and  led  into  a  cul-dc-sac,  the  end  of  which  we  had  to 
ascend  with  difficulty.  As  the  route  I  speak  of  involves 
a  considerable  detour  and  some  climbing,  no  traveller 
will  be  taken  through  it  if  the  path  along  the  side  of  the 
Lee  be  not  covered  with  water  ;  and  I  cannot  conscien- 
tiously recommend  every  one  to  go  into  the  labyrinth. 
True,  it  is  used  by  the  mountaineers  when  the  other  path 
is  not  passable  ;  but  they  are  very  rarely  obliged  to  have 
recourse  to  it,  because  they  can  time  their  journey  so  as 
to  make  the  passage  of  the  river  when  the  snows  above 
are  frozen  up,  and  consequently  the  water  is  low.  True, 
also,  no  rocks  fell  during  our  passage,  but  the  floor  was 
paved  with  them  ;  there  were  hundreds  of  rocks  which  a 
mere  touch  would  have  sent  down,  and  I  saw  evidence 
enough  to  prove  that  whole  sides  of  the  ravines  some- 
times give  way ;  so  that,  unless  the  traveller  had  a 
charmed  life,  his  curiosity  would  expose  him  to  a  very 
fair  chance  of  being  suddenly  knocked  on  the  head  by  a 
stone  a  ton  weight,  or  buried  under  hundreds  of  feet  of 
tertiary  strata. 

It  is  similar  strata  which  afford  so  extraordinary  a 
position  and  appearance  to  Dankar,  the  capital  of 
Spiti,  which  is  a  British  Himaliyan  province,  under  an 
Assistant  Commissioner,  who  resides  in  the  warmer  and 
more  fruitful  Kiilu  valley.  This  town  is  perched  about 
a  thousand  feet  above  the  Lee,  on  the  ledges  and  towers 
of  an  immense  ridge  of  soft  strata,  which  descends 
towards  the  river,  but  breaks  off  with  a  sudden  fall  after 
affording  ground  for  the  fort,  houses,  and  Lama  temples 
of  Dankar.  Its  appearance  is  so  extraordinary,  that  I 
shall  not  attempt  any  description  of  it  until  able  to 
present  my  readers  with  a  copy  of  its  photograph.     It 


HA NGRA  NG,  SPIT/,  A ND  POL  YA  NDR  Y.         183 

has  only  its  picturesqueness,  however,  to  recommend  it, 
for  the  interior  is  as  miserable  as  that  of  the  smallest 
Himaliyan  village  ;  and  the  people,  being  under  British 
rule,  have  of  course  a  proper  contempt  for  British 
travellers,  though  so  little  troubled  by  them.  No  one 
offered  to  show  us  where  to  pitch  our  tents,  or  to  render 
any  other  civility.  The  mukca  was  away,  and  his  re- 
presentative was  both  insolent  and  exorbitant  in  his 
demands.  Here  was  the  style  which  he  adopted,  and 
was  supported  in  by  the  people  about  him.  As  was 
afterwards  proved  by  my  making  him  produce  his 
nerrick,  or  official  list  of  prices,  he  began  by  demanding 
double  price  from  us  for  the  sheep  and  grain  we 
wanted  ;  and  when  we  said  quite  civilly  that  he  was 
charging  too  much,  he  at  once  answered  impudently, 
and  without  the  least  excuse  for  doing  so,  "Oh  !  if  you 
want  to  use  force,  by  all  means  take  what  you  want  for 
nothing,  and  I  shall  report  the  matter  to  the  Com- 
missioner in  Kulu."  Fortunately  for  him  there  was  no 
Chinese  territory  near  ;  but,  through  the  medium  of  the 
young  schoolmaster  of  Dankar,  who  understood  Plin- 
dtisthani,  I  made  him  and  his  friends  somewhat  ashamed 
of  his  conduct  ;  and  it  was  the  more  inexcusable  be- 
cause the  prices  of  the  nerrick  are  fixed  at  a  higher 
rate  than  those  which  prevail,  in  order  that  there  may 
be  no  hardship  in  affording  travellers  the  right  of  pur- 
chasing supplies — a  right  which  it  is  absolutely  necessary 
that  they  should  have,  in  order  to  travel  at  all  in  a  district 
of  country  where  there  are  so  few  open  markets. 

I  have  referred  more  than  once  in  these  chapters 
to  the  polyandry  of  the  people  among  whom  I  so- 
journed ;  and  though  this  delicate  subject  has  been 
alluded  to  in  several  publications,  it  is  sufficiently  novel 
to  the  general  reader  to  call  for  a  little  explanation 
here.      Indeed,  I    find   there    are    many    well-educated 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


persons  who  do  not  even  know  what  polyandry  means. 
It  has  a  very  botanical  kind  of  sound  ;  and  its  German 
equivalent  Vielmiinnerci,  though  coarse  and  expressive, 
does  not  throw  much  light  upon  the  subject.  A  mis- 
take also  has  been  made  in  contrasting  polyandry  with 
polygamy  ;  whereas,  being  the  marriage  of  one  woman 
with  two  or  more  men,  it  is  itself  a  form  of  polygamy, 
and  ought  properly  to  be  contrasted  with  polygany,  or 
the  marriage  of  one  man  to  two  or  more  women.  But 
the  polyandry  of  Central  Asia  must  further  be  limited 
to  the  marriage  of  one  woman  to  two  or  more  brothers, 
for  no  other  form  is  found  there,  so  far  as  I  could 
learn. 

This  curious  and  revolting  custom  exists  all  over  the 
country  of  the  Tibetan-speaking  people  ;  that  is  to  say, 
from  China  to  the  dependencies  of  Kashmir  and  Afghan- 
istan, with  the  exception  of  Sikkim,  and  some  other 
of  the  provinces  on  the  Indian  side  of  the  Himaliya, 
where,  though  the  Tibetan  language  may  in  part  prevail 
yet  the  people  are  either  Aryan  in  race,  or  have  been 
much  influenced  by  Aryan  ideas.  I  found  polyandry  to 
exist  commonly  from  Taranda,  in  the  Sutlej  valley,  a 
few  marches  from  Simla,  up  to  Chinese  Tibet,  and  from 
there  to  Suru,  where  it  disappeared  in  the  polygamy  of 
the  Mohammedan  Kashmiris.  But  it  is  well  known  to 
exist,  and  to  be  an  almost  universal  custom,  all  through 
Chinese  Tibet,  Little  Tibet,  and  nearly  all  the  Tibetan- 
speaking  provinces.  It  is  not  confined  to  that  region, 
however,  and  is  probably  the  common  marriage  custom 
of  at  least  thirty  millions  of  respectable  people.  It  is 
quite  unnecessary  to  go  deeply  into  the  origin  and 
working  of  this  very  peculiar  marital  arrangement ;  but 
it  is  well  worthy  of  notice,  as  showing  how  purely 
artificial  a  character  such  arrangements  may  assume, 
and  what  desperate  means  are  had  recourse  to  in  order 


HANGRANG,  SPITI,  AND  POLYANDRY.  185 

to  get  rid  of  the  pressure  caused  by  the  acknowledged 
law  of  population. 

In  the  most  elaborate  and  valuable  compilation  there 
is  on  Lamaism — "  Die  Lamaische  Hierarchie  und 
Kirche,"  by  Carl  Friedrich  Koeppen — that  author,  in 
his  brief  reference  to  this  subject,  clears  the  religion  of 
Tibet  of  any  responsibility  for  polyandry,  and  asserts 
that  it  existed  in  the  country  before  the  introduction  of 
Budhism,  having  arisen  from  the  pressure  of  popula- 
tion.* In  Ceylon,  which  is  a  great  Biidhist  country, 
polyandry  also  exists,  and,  at  least  till  very  lately,  has 
been  legally  acknowledged  by  the  British  Government  ; 
but  I  have  not  found  anything  which  proves  that  the 
religion  of  the  Singalese  is  any  more  responsible  for 
the  custom  than  is  the  British  Government  itself.  We 
know  also  that  polyandry  has  existed  in  non-Budhistic 
countries,  and  even  in  Great  Britain,  along  with  worse 
marriage  customs,  as  Caesar  testifies  in  his  "  De  Bello 
Gallico"  (lib.  v.  xiv.),  jvhen  he  says,  "  Uxores  habent 
deni  duodenique  inter  se  communes,  et  maxime,  fratres 
cum  fratribus,  et  parentes  cum  liberis."  Traces  are  to  be 
found  of  it  among  the  ancient  Indo-Aryans,  as  in  the 
Mahabarat,  where  Dranpadi  is  represented  as  married  to 
the  five  sons  of  Pandu  ;  and  in  the  Ramayana,  where  the 
giant  Viradha  attacks  the  two  divine  brothers  Rama  and 
Lakshaman,  and  their  wife  Sita,  saying,  "  Why  do  you 
two  devotees  remain  with  one  woman  ?  Why  do  you, 
O  profligate  wretches !  thus  corrupting  the  devout 
sages  ? "     Even  so  early  as  in    the   Rig- Veda   Sanhita 

*  "  Die  Schuld  dieser  widrigen  und  unnalurlichen  Einiichtung 
tr'agt  iibrigens  keinesweges  der  Lamaismus  ;  der  Gebrauch  bestand 
vielmehr  bei  den  Bodpa  langst  vor  ihrer  Bekanntschaft  mit  der  Religion 
des  ShaUjasohnes  und  findet  seine  Erklarung  und  Entschuldigung  in  der 
ubergrossen  Armuih  des  Schneelandcs  und  in  der  aus  dieser  entspiingenden 
Nothwendigkeit,  dem  Anvvachsen  der  Bevolkerung  Schianken  zu  selzen." 


1 86  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

(Mandala  I.  Hymn  117,  v.  5)  there  is  some  trace  of 
the  custom  in  the  passage,  "  Asvvins,  your  admirable 
(horses),  bore  the  car  which  you  had  harnessed  (first)  to 
the  goal,  for  the  sake  of  honour  ;  and  the  damsel  who 
was  the  prize  came  through  affection  to  you  and 
acknowledged  your  husbandship,  saying  '  you  are  (my) 
lords.' "  I  think  polyandry  of  a  kind  is  even  sanctioned 
in  the  laws  of  Menu. 

There  are  many  other  traces  of  the  existence  of  poly- 
andry in  the  ancient  world,  and  it  also  appears  in  various 
countries  in  our  own  or  in  very  recent  times.  As  to  the 
Singalese,  Sir  Emerson  Tennent  says  that  "  polyandry 
prevails  throughout  the  interior  of  Ceylon,  chiefly 
amongst  the  wealthier  classes.  .  .  .  As  a  general  rule, 
the  husbands  are  members  of  the  same  family,  and 
most  frequently  brothers."  Here  there  is  a  slight  dif- 
ference from  the  polyandry  where  the  husbands  are 
always  brothers.  The  Abbe  Desgodins  speaks  of  proches 
parents,  or  near  relatives  in  general,  being  joined  in 
this  relationship,  as  well  as  brothers,  in  the  east  of  the 
country;  but  I  repeatedly  inquired  into  that  point,  and 
on  consulting  Herr  Jaeschke  at  Herrnhut  in  regard  to 
it,  he  said  he  had  flever  known  or  heard  of  any  other 
kind  of  polyandry  in  Tibet  except  fraternal.  Polyandry 
notably  exists  among  the  Todas  of  Southern  India,  and 
it  has  been  found  in  regions  very  far  distant  from  each 
other,  as  among  the  Kalmucks,  the  Tasmanians,  and 
the  Iroquois  of  North  America  ;  but  nowhere  does  it  take 
such  a  singular  form  as  among  the  Nairs  of  the  Malabar 
coast,  who  are  nominally  married  to  girls  of  their  own 
caste,  but  never  have  any  intercourse  with  their  wives  ; 
while  these  latter  may  have  as  many  lovers  as  they 
please,  if  the  lovers  are  Brahmins,  or  Nairs  other  than 
the  husband. 

Such  arrangements,  however,  are  mere  freaks,  and  are 


HANG  RANG,  SPITI,  AND  POLYANDRY.  187 

not  to  be  compared  with  the  regular,  extensive,  and 
solidified  system  of  Tibetan  polyandry.  General  Cun- 
ningham, in  his  valuable  work  on  Ladak,  says  that  the 
system  "  prevails,  of  course,  only  among  the  poorer 
classes  ;  "  but  my  experience  was  that  it  prevailed  among 
all  classes,  and  was  superseded  by  polygany  only  where 
the  people  were  a  good  deal  in  contact  with  either 
Hindus  or  Mohammedans.  Turner,  who  had  so  much 
opportunity  of  seeing  Western  Tibet,  is  quite  clear  on 
this  point  as  regards  that  part  of  the  country,  for  he  says 
(p.  349) — "  The  number  of  husbands  is  not,  as  far  as  I 
could  learn,  defined  or  restricted  within  any  limits.  It 
sometimes  happens  that  in  a  small  family  there  is  but 
one  male  ;  and  the  number  may  seldom  perhaps  exceed 
that  which  a  native  of  rank,  during  my  residence  at 
Teshoo  Loomboo,  pointed  out  to  me  in  a  family  resident 
in  the  neighbourhood,  in  which  five  brothers  were  then 
living  together  very  happily  with  one  female,  under  the 
same  connubial  compact.  Nor  is  this  sort  of  compact 
confined  to  the  lower  ranks  of  people  alone  ;  it  is  found 
also  frequently  in  the  most  opulent  families." 

I  met  only  one  case  in  which  the  number  of  husbands 
exceeded  that  of  the  instance  mentioned  above.  It  was 
that  of  the  family  of  the  miikca  at  Pu,  in  which  six  bro- 
thers were  married  to  one  wife,  but  the  youngest  of  the 
brothers  was  quite  a  boy.  The  husband  I  saw  must 
have  been  over  thirty  ;  and  as  he  had  two  elder  brothers, 
the  arrangement,  as  a  whole,  struck  one  as  even  more 
revolting  than  usual.  Instances  of  three  and  five  hus- 
bands were  quite  common  ;  but,  without  having  gone 
rigidly  into  the  matter,  I  should  say  that  the  most  in- 
stances of  polyandry  were  those  of  two  husbands,  and 
that,  not  because  there  was  any  objection  to  five  or  six, 
but  simply  because  no  greater  number  of  brothers  was 
usually  to  be    found  in  a  family,  as  might  have  been 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


expected  from  such  a  system,  and  as  also  one  of  the 
great  ends  which  that  system  is  designed  to  effect. 

As  to  the  working  of  polyandry  in  Tibet,  I  noticed  no 
particular  evidence  of  its  evil  effects,  though  doubtless 
they  exist ;  and  in  this  respect  I  am  at  one  with  the 
other  European  travellers,  with  the  single  exception  of 
the  Abbe  Desgodins,  who  draws  a  very  frightful  picture 
of  the  state  of  morals  in  the  eastern  part  of  the  country. 
He  says  :  "  L,es  hommes  riches  peuvent  avoir  autant  de 
femmes  qu'ils  le  desirent,  sans  compter  que  quand  ils 
sont  en  voyage,  et  qu'ils  font  visite  a.  leurs  amis,  la  poli- 
tesse  veut  qu'on  leur  en  prete  partout.  Au  Thibet  on  se 
prete  sa  femme  comme  on  se  pr£te  une  paire  de  bottes 
ou  w\\  couteau.  .  .  .  Les  Thibetans  n'ont  pas  non  plus 
le  moindre  souci  de  l'honneur  de  leur  filles  ;  celle  qui  est 
devenue  mere  trouve  meme  plus  facilement  a  se  marier, 
par  la  raison  que  celui  qui  l'achete  est  certain  qu'elle 
n'est  pas  sterile  ;  ce  devergondage  de  mceurs  est  cause 
d'une  sterilite  g6nerale."  *  There  is  probably  some 
exaggeration  here  ;  and,  making  allowance  for  that,  the 
description  would  apply  to  most  semi-civilised  races, 
and  need  not  be  charged  to  the  fault  of  polyandry.  The 
accusation  brought  by  the  worthy  Abbe  against  the 
young  persons  of  Tibet  is  precisely  the  same  as  that 
which  Sir  Anthony  Weldon  made  against  the  Scotch  in 
the  time  of  James  VI. ,f  and  can  be  brought,  even  at  the 
present  day,  against  a  considerable  portion  of  the  agri- 
cultural and  pastoral  population  of  Scotland.  It  is 
absurd  for  Europeans  to  hold  up  their  hands  in  holy 
horror  at  the  immorality  which  they  may  observe  in 
ruder  and  less  highly  favoured  countries,  when  our  own 

*  "  La  Mission  du  Thibet  de  1855  a  1S70."     Verdun,  1872. 

t  "  A  Perfect   Description   of  the   People  and  Country  of  Scotland." 


I/ondon,  1 659. 


HANGRANG,  SPIT/,  AND  POLYANDRY.  1S9 

centres  of  civilisation  present,  in  that  respect,  such  curious 
results.  Fraternal  polyandry  is  not  merely  opposed  both 
to  artificial  arrangements  and  the  highest  morality,  but 
even  to  our  natural  instincts.  But  there  is  no  sense  in 
charging  it  with  evils  which  we  see  existing  everywhere. 
It  is  more  revolting  than  the  prostitution,  or  unlegalised 
polyandry,  of  the  West;  but  its  lesson  will  be  lost  if  it 
be  viewed  otherwise  than  in  the  cold  white  light  of 
reason. 

It  is  almost  impossible  for  us  to  conceive  of  such  a 
system  being  in  operation,  and  of  its  allowing  room  for 
affection  between  relatives  ;  and  so  it  may  be  well  to 
note  that  it  exists.  This  could  only  happen  among  a 
race  of  a  peculiarly  placid,  unpassionate  temperament, 
as  the  Turanians  unquestionably  are,  except  in  their  fits 
of  demoniacal  cruelty.  They  have  no  hot  blood,  in  our 
sense  of  the  phrase,  and  all  interests  are  subordinate  to 
those  of  the  family.  This  supreme  family  feeling  pre- 
vents any  difficulty  arising  in  connection  with  the  chil- 
dren, who  are  regarded  as  scions  of  the  house  rather  than 
of  any  particular  member  of  it.  It  has  been  said  that,. 
where  there  is  more  than  one  husband,  the  paternity  of 
the  child  is  unknown,  but  that  is  doubtful,  though  all  the 
husbands  are  held  responsible,  and  there  is  no  notice- 
able difference  in  the  relationship  of  a  child  to  his  differ- 
ent fathers.  All  this  would  be  impossible  in  a  race  with 
strong  passions,  or  where  the  element  of  individuality  is 
strongly  developed  ;  but  it  is  exactly  in  these  respects 
that  the  Turanians  are  most  deficient. 

Of  course  there  is  a  large  number  of  surplus  women 
under  this  polyandric  system,  and  they  are  provided  for 
in  the  Lama  nunneries,  where  they  learn  to  read  and 
copy  the  Tibetan  Scriptures,  and  to  engage  in  religious 
services.  The  nunneries  have  usually  a  certain  amount 
of  land  attached  to   them,  which  is  cultivated  by  the 


190  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

occupants,  who  also  hire  out  their  services  in  the  harvest 
season.  I  have  even  had  my  baggage  carried  by  Lama 
nuns,  when  there  was  a  pressure  of  occupation,  and 
observed  nothing  particular  in  their  demeanour,  except 
that  it  was  a  little  more  reserved  than  that  of  the  other 
women.  Of  course  accidents  do  happen  occasionally; 
but  the  excitement  which  they  cause  is  a  proof  that 
they  are  not  very  common.  When  I  was  at  Pu,  a  great 
noise  was  caused  by  a  Lama  nun — the  daughter  of  a 
wealthy  zemindar — having  suddenly  increased  the  popu- 
lation of  that  village,  in  defiance  of  the  law  of  popula- 
tion and  her  holy  vow.  About  a  year  before,  a  visit 
had  been  made  to  Pu  by  a  celebrated  Lama  from  the 
interior  of  Chinese  Tibet,  whose  claims  to  sanctity  were 
so  high  that  the  zemindar  invited  him  to  stay  in  his 
house  and  expound  the  Tibetan  Scriptures.  The  nun 
came  down  to  these  reunions  from  her  convent,  a  few 
hundred  feet  up  the  mountain-side,  and  the  consequence 
was  the  event  which  I  have  just  noticed.  Meanwhile 
the  holy  man  had  meanly,  but  judiciously,  gone 
back  into  Chinese  Tibet.  He  was  hopelessly  beyond 
reach  ;  and  the  scandal  being  great,  the  father,  both  on 
his  own  account  and  on  that  of  his  daughter,  had  to 
pay  about  Rs.  300  in  all,  to  the  convent,  to  the  scanda- 
lised village,  and  to  the  state.  Such  offences  are  readily 
condoned  on  a  sufficient  monetary  fine  being  paid  ;  but 
I  heard  also  that  the  nun  would  not  be  reinstated  in  her 
former  position  without  undergoing  penance  and  mani- 
festing contrition.  Such  a  sin,  however,  can  hardly  tell 
against  her  long,  if  her  conduct  be  correct  afterwards  ;  for 
the  superior  of  this  very  monastery  had  herself  an  illegiti- 
mate daughter,  who  was  enrolled  among  the  sisterhood. 
Some  sects  of  the  Lamas  are  allowed  to  marry,  but  those 
who  do  not  are  considered  more  holy  ;  and  in  no  sect  are 
the  nuns  allowed  to  marry,  and  the}7,  as  well  as  most  of 


HANG  RANG,  SPTTI,  AND  POLYANDRY.  191 

the  monks,  take  a  vow  of  absolute  continence.  I  am 
scarcely  in  a  position  to  have  any  decided  opinion  as  to 
how  far  this  vow  is  observed,  but  am  inclined  to  believe 
that  it  is  so  usually,  notwithstanding  the  exceptions  to 
the  rule. 

The  Lama  church  does  not  concern  itself  with  the 
marriage  union,  though  its  priests  often  take  part  in 
the  ceremonies  accompanying  the  bridal, — as,  for  in- 
stance, in  fixing  upon  an  auspicious  day.  Marriages  are 
often  concluded  at  a  very  early  age,  by  the  parents  of 
the  parties,  and  sometimes  when  the  latter  are  children. 
In  such  cases  the  bride  and  bridegroom  often  live  for 
years  separate,  in  the  houses  of  their  respective  parents. 
When  the  matter  has  not  been  previously  arranged  by 
his  father,  the  young  man  who  wishes  to  marry  goes  to 
the  parents  of  the  girl  he  has  selected  with  a  gift  of 
cJioug,  a  species  of  beer  which  is  brewed  among  the 
mountains,  and  this  he  partakes  of  along  with  them.  A 
second  visit  of  the  same  kind  follows,  and  then  a  third, 
when  he  meets  with  the  object  of  his  choice,  and  the 
nuptials  are  arranged.  In  some  parts  of  the  country 
more  valuable  presents,  and  even  gifts  of  money,  are 
expected,  there  being  a  great  deal  of  difference  in  local 
usage  as  to  the  preliminaries.  Women  have  property  in 
their  own  right  ;  and,  as  a  rule,  childless  women  are  not 
regarded  in  any  particular  manner.  The  choice  of  a 
wife  is  the  right  of  the  elder  brother  ;  and  among  the 
Tibetan-speaking  people  it  universally  prevails  that  the 
contract  he  makes  is  understood  to  involve  a  marital 
contract  with  all  the  other  brothers,  if  they  choose  to 
avail  themselves  of  it. 

We  have  already  seen  what  Koeppen  says  as  to  the 

origin  of  this  hideous  polyandry.       Herr  Jaeschke  also 

assured  me  that  he  knew  of  no  polyandric  traditions  in 

.Tibet,  and  that  the  system  there  must  be  indefinitely 


192  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

old.  The  probability  is  that  it  has  descended  from  a  state 
of  society  somewhat  similar  to  that  which  at  present 
exists  in  the  Himaliya,  but  more  primitive,  ruder,  and 
uninfluenced  by  the  civilisations  of  India  and  China  ; 
while  those  who  believe  that  human  beings  at  one  time 
herded  together  very  much  like  flocks  of  animals,  see  in  it 
a  transition  from  a  still  more  savage  past.  There  is  not 
much  use  in  speculating  on  the  origin  of  customs  when 
that  origin  lies  concealed  in  the  mist  of  antiquity. 
Such  speculation  takes  very  much  the  shape  of  finding 
or  inventing  uses  which  the  custom  under  discussion 
might  subserve  ;  but  that  is  a  very  unsatisfactory  region 
of  thought  where  there  are  no  historical  facts  to  afford 
guidance.  All  we  can  really  say  on  this  subject  is,  that 
polyandry  does  subserve  certain  useful  ends.  In  a  pri- 
mitive and  not  very  settled  state  of  society,  when  the 
head  of  a  family  is  often  called  away  on  long  mercantile 
journeys,  or  to  attend  at  court,  or  for  purposes  of  war, 
it  is  a  certain  advantage  that  he  should  be  able  to  leave 
a  relative  in  his  place  whose  interests  are  bound  up  with 
his  own.  Mr  Talboys  Wheeler  has  suggested  that  poly- 
andry arose  among  a  pastoral  people,  whose  men  were 
away  from  their  families  for  months  at  a  time,  and 
where  the  duty  of  protecting  these  families  would  be 
undertaken  by  the  brothers  in  turn.  The  system  cer- 
tainly answers  such  an  end,  and  I  never  knew  of  a  case 
where  a  polyandric  wife  was  left  without  the  society  of 
one  at  least  of  her  husbands.  But  the  great,  the  notable 
end  which  polyandry  serves,  is  that  of  checking  the 
increase  of  population  in  regions  from  which  emigration 
is  difficult,  and  where  it  is  also  difficult  to  increase  the 
means  of  subsistence.  That  the  Malthusian  law,  or 
something  very  like  it,  is  in  operation,  is  now  all  but 
universally  admitted  by  political  economists.  The.e  is 
a  tendency  on  the  part  of  population  to  increase  at  a 


HANGRANG,  SPITI,  AND  POLYANDRY.  193 

greater  ratio  than  its  power  of  producing  food  ;  and  few 
more  effectual  menus  to  check  that  tendency  could  well 
be  devised  than  the  system  of  Tibetan  polyandry  taken 
in  conjunction  with  the  Lama  monasteries  and  nunneries. 
Very  likely  it  was  never  deliberately  devised  to  do  so, 
and  came  down  from  some  very  rude  state  of  society  ; 
but,  at  all  events,  it  must  have  been  found  exceedingly 
serviceable  in  repressing  population  among  what  Koep- 
pen  so  well  calls  the  snow-lands  of  Asia.  If  population 
had  increased  there  at  the  rate  it  has  in  England  during 
this  century,  frightful  results  must  have  followed  either 
to  the  Tibetans  or  to  their  immediate  neighbours.  As  it 
is,  almost  every  one  in  the  Himaliya  has  either  land  and 
a  house  of  his  own,  or  land  and  a  house  in  which  he  has 
a  share,  and  which  provide  for  his  protection  and  sub- 
sistence. The  people  are  hard-worked  in  summer  and 
autumn,  and  they  are  poor  in  the  sense  of  having  small 
possessions  and  few  luxuries  ;  but  they  are  not  poor  in 
the  sense  of  presenting  a  very  poor  class  at  a  loss  how 
to  procure  subsistence.  I  was  a  little  surprised  to  find 
that  one  of  the  Moravian  missionaries  defended  the 
polyandry  of  the  Tibetans,  not  as  a  thing  to  be  approved 
of  in  the  abstract,  or  tolerated  among  Christians,  but  as 
good  for  the  heathen  of  so  sterile  a  country.  In  taking 
this  view,  he  proceeded  on  the  argument  that  super- 
abundant population,  in  an  unfertile  country,  must  be  a 
great  calamity,  and  produce  "  eternal  warfare  or  eternal 
want."  Turner  took  also  a  similar  view,  and  he  ex- 
pressly says,  "  The  influence  of  this  custom  on  the 
manners  of  the  people,  as  far  as  I  could  trace,  has 
not  been  unfavourable.  .  .  .  To  the  privileges  of  un- 
bounded liberty  the  wife  here  adds  the  character  of  mis- 
tress of  the  family  and  companion  of  her  husbands." 
But,  lest  so  pleasing  a  picture  may  delude  some 
strong-minded    ladies   to    get    up  an    agitation  for   the 


194  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

establishment  of  polyandry  in  the  West,  I  must  say  it 
struck  me  that  the  having  many  husbands  sometimes 
appeared  to  be  only  having  many  masters  and  in- 
creased toil  and  trouble.  I  also  am  by  no  means  sure 
that  the  Tibetans  are  so  chivalrous  as  to  uphold  poly- 
andry because  they  regard  "  the  single  possession  of  one 
woman  as  a  blessing  too  great  for  one  individual  to 
aspire  to."  Nor  shall  I  commit  myself  to  the  ingenious 
opinion  that  "  marriage  amongst  them  seems  to  be  con- 
sidered rather  as  an  odium — a  heavy  burden — the 
weight  and  obloquy  of  which  a  whole  family  are  dis- 
posed to  lessen  by  sharing  it  among  them." 


CHAPTER  VI. 

SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS. —  THE  ALPS  AND  HIMALIYA. 

The  valley  of  Spiti  is  secluded  in  such  a  very  formid- 
able manner  from  the  civilised  world  that  it  has  very 
few  European  visitors  ;  and  though  it  has  frequently 
been  conquered,  yet  it  is  difficult  to  conceive  of  its  being 
so,  or  of  any  one  finding  it  worth  while  to  conquer  it. 
This  province  is  situated  in  the  centre  of  the  Himaliya, 
with  two  great  snowy  ranges  (not  to  speak  of  minor  ones) 
between  it  and  the  plains  of  India.  There  are  very  (g\v 
parts  in  Spiti  where  we  can  get  below  12,000  feet,  while 
it  contains  innumerable  points  which  are  20,000  feet 
high,  and  its  great  valley  has  an  average  elevation  of 
about  12,800  feet.  Elevated  and  secluded  though  this 
province  be,  it  is  not  to  be  compared  in  these  admirable 
respects  with  Zanskar  ;  but  it  is  tolerably  well  raised  out 
of  the  world.  On  the  east,  access  can  be  had  to  it  by 
the  1 8, coo-feet  Manerung  Pass,  or  the  difficult  To-tzo 
route.  From  the  south,  the  only  entrance  is  by  the 
desolate  Babah  Pass,  which  is  15,000  feet  high,  and 
closed  great  part  of  the  year.  To  the  west,  the  direction 
which  I  am  about  to  pursue,  there  are  no  means  of  exit 
or  access  except  over  glaciers  and  an  utterly  desolate 
region,  which  requires  days  in  order  to  traverse  it.  To 
the  north  there  are  a  few  passes  like  the  Parangla 
(18,000  feet),  which  take  towards  Ladak  :  but  nobody 
need  go  to  Ladak  in  search  of  civilisation.  I  did  see  one 
solitary  apricot-tree  at  Lari,  and  some  fine  willow-trees 
at  Po  ;  but  that  about  exhausts  my  arboreal  recollections 


196  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

of  Spiti,  or  Piti,  as  the  people  of  the  country  more 
usually  call  it.  There  are  a  good  many  willow,  birch, 
and  thorn  bushes ;  but  still  there  must  be  a  great 
scarcity  of  fuel.  Notwithstanding  that  it  is  about 
seventy  miles  long,  with  a  breadth  of  fifty  miles  in 
its  upper  portion,  its  population  amounts  to  only  about 
2300  persons,  whose  language  is  Tibetan,  and  whose 
appearance  has  some  Tartar  characteristics.  The 
minstrels,  to  whom  I  have  already  alluded,  do  not 
hold  land,  and  are  called  Bedas.  Captain  Harcourt 
says,  "  Many  of  the  men  resemble  veritable  Calmucks  ; 
and  with  few  exceptions  fall,  as  do  the  women,  very  far 
below  the  European  standard  of  beauty ;  indeed,  for 
positive  hideousness  of  countenance,  the  people  of  Spiti 
are  perhaps  pre-eminent  in  the  British  Empire."  For 
absolute  hideousness,  so  great  as  to  be  almost  beauty 
of  a  kind,  I  would  back  a  Spiti  old  woman  against  the 
w:hole  human  race  ;  and  the  production  of  one  in  Europe, 
with  her  extraordinary  ornaments,  could  scarcely  fail 
to  create  a  great  sensation.  The  dress  of  both  sexes 
may  be  described  as  tunics  and  trousers  of  thick 
woollen  stuff,  with  large  boots,  partly  of  leather,  partly 
of  blanket,  which  come  up  to  the  knee,  and  which  they 
are  not  fond  of  taking  off  at  any  time.  In  order  to 
obtain  greater  warmth  they  often  put  a  quantity  of  flour 
into  these  boots,  beside  their  legs,  which  I  fancy  is  a 
practice  peculiar  to  Spiti,  but  might  be  introduced  else- 
where. The  ornaments  are  very  much  the  same  as  those 
of  the  Chinese  Tartars,  except  that  the  women  have 
sometimes  nose-rings,  which  adds  to  their  peculiar 
fascination.  Not  being  affected  by  caste  ideas,  as  even 
the  Lamaists  of  Kunawar  are,  the  people  of  Spiti  make 
no  objections  to  a  European  eating  with  them  or  entering 
their  houses,  unless  they  happen  to  be  rather  ashamed 
of  the  interior ;  but  the  houses  differ  very  little  from 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  197 

those  of  Zansl<ar,  one  of  which  I  shall  describe  in  detail, 
having  had  to  spend  two  days  in  it  during  a  great  snow- 
storm. There  is  very  little  rainfall  in  Spiti ;  from  No- 
vember to  April  all  the  streams  are  frozen  up,  and  it  is 
rather  a  mystery  to  me  how  the  people  obtain  sufficient 
fuel  to  support  life  during  that  long  severe  period.  In 
summer  the  fields  are  watered  by  artificial  channels 
leading  from  the  mountain  torrents  ;  and  it  has  often  a 
very  lively  effect  when  the  waters  are  let  loose  around 
and  over  a  number  of  fields.  The  chief  crops  are  wheat, 
barley,  and  peas,  the  latter  affording  a  valuable  addition 
to  the  traveller's  food,  but  not  so  readily  purchasable 
as  the  grain.  One  need  not  look  for  sugar,  fruit,  or  any 
other  of  the  luxuries  of  life,  in  this  exceedingly  sterile 
province.  Yaks  there  are  in  abundance,  along  with 
zo-pos  and  the  common  Indian  ox  ;  and  the  gkimts,  or 
small  ponies,  are  famous  for  their  sure-footedness,  their 
sagacity,  and  their  power  of  carrying  their  riders  safely 
up  and  down  the  most  terrible,  dangerous,  and  fatiguing 
paths.  Horse-racing,  of  a  very  irregular  sort,  is  indulged 
in  occasionally ;  and  the  blacksmiths  of  Spiti  are  famous 
in  High  Asia  for  their  manufacture  of  steel  bits  and 
stirrups.  The  great  substitute  for  paper  here,  as  in  all 
these  snow-lands,  is  the  inner  bark  of  the  birch-tree, 
which  is  of  a  light  yellow  colour,  and  very  soft,  though 
of  a  close  texture.  It  is  very  good  for  all  wrapping 
purposes,  and  could  be  used  for  writing  on  if  needed. 
The  people  are  singularly  exempt  from  disease,  being, 
to  all  appearance,  afflicted  only  by  a  few  not  bad  cases 
of  skin  disease,  which  can  easily  be  accounted  for  by 
their  persistent  avoidance  of  washing.  Spiti  is  Budhistic  ; 
and  there  are  nearly  400  Lamas  in  the  province,  most  of 
whom  are  bound  to  celibacy,  and  only  about  a  dozen 
nuns, — though  that  must  be  quite  enough,  if  it  be  true, 
as  Captain  Harcourt,  lately  the  Assistant  Commissioner 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


for  the  three  British  provinces  of  Kulu,  Lahaul,  and 
Spiti,  alleges,  that  "  there  are  at  times  scenes  of  gross 
debauchery  in  the  monasteries — a  state  of  things  which 
can  be  believed  when  Lamas  and  nuns  are  living  pro- 
miscuously together."  As  polyandry  exists  in  the 
province,  the  surplus  women  have  to  remain  in  the 
houses  of  their  parents  or  other  relatives ;  but  there  is 
no  reason  to  consider  the  Spiti  people  as  immoral,  though 
they  indulge  in  heavy  drinking  on  special  occasions ; 
and,  like  most  mountaineers,  they  are  exceedingly 
enamoured  of  their  own  lofty  country,  treeless  and 
sterile  though  it  be,  and  are  extremely  unwilling  to 
go  down  any  of  the  passes  which  lead  to  more  genial 
climes.  The  poverty  of  this  province,  however,  has  not 
saved  it  from  more  than  one  conquest.  Nearly  a  thou- 
sand years  ago,  it  was  under  the  Lassa  Government; 
and  two  centuries  after,  it  fell  under  the  dominion  of 
Kublai  Khan.  In  more  recent  times,  it  was  sometimes 
subject  to  the  Chinese  Tartars  and  sometimes  to  the 
chiefs  of  Baltistan  or  of  Ladak,  according  to  which  party 
happened  to  have  the  upper  hand  in  the  neighbourhood. 
It  came  into  our  possession  about  thirty  years  ago, 
through  an  arrangement  with  the  Maharajah  of  Kashmir, 
into  whose  power  it  had  fallen,  and  was  conjoined  with 
Kulu  under  an  Assistant  Commissioner  in  1849. 

Dankar,  the  capital  of  Spiti,  should  properly  be 
spelled  "  Drankhar,"  which  means  "The  cold  fort."  Khar, 
with  an  aspirate,  signifies  a  fort,  as  Dan-kar  is,  or  rather 
was  ;.but  kar  means  white.  Hence  it  has  been  a  decided 
error  to  call  this  place  Dankar;  but  I  shall  leave  the 
correction  of  it  to  Dr  W.  W.  Hunter  and  his  department, 
for  though  Spiti  does  not  boast  of  a  post-office,  yet  it  is 
a  British  province.  The  precise  height  of  this  village 
is  12,776  feet,  so  it  may  easily  be  conceived  that  the 
nights  were  intensely  cold  in  our  light  tents,  and  that 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  199 

there  was  some  little  difficulty  in  rousing-  my  people  in 
the  morning.  From  Dankar,  or  rather  from  Kazeh  or 
Kaja,  a  day's  journey  beyond,  my  course  was  a  novel 
one,  almost  unknown  to  Himaliyan  tourists.  When 
considering,  at  Simla,  how  I  should  best  see  the  Hima- 
liya  and  keep  out  of  the  reach  of  the  Indian  monsoon,  I 
had  the  advantage  of  an  old  edition  of  Montgomerie's 
map,  in  which  the  mountains  and  rivers  are  laid  in,  but 
which  is  now  out  of  print;  and  I  saw  from  it  that  the  lie 
of  the  Himaliya  to  the  north-west  presented  a  series  of 
rivers  and  elevated  valleys,  in  the  very  centre  of  the 
ranges,  which  would  enable  me  to  proceed  to  Kashmir 
by  almost  a  new  route,  and  one  of  great  interest.  I 
could  get  no  information  about  this  route,  further  than 
was  conveyed  by  the  admission  of  a  Panjabi  captain, 
who  had  been  in  the  Himaliya,  and  who  said  on  my 
consulting'  him  on  the  subject,  "  Well,  I  should  think  it 
would  be  very  possible."  It  certainly  proved  to  be  so, 
seeing  that  I  got  over  the  ground  ;  and  I  got  some  infor- 
mation regarding  it  from  the  Moravian  missionaries. 

What  I  had  to  do  was  to  follow  up  the  Lee  or  Spiti 
river  almost  to  its  source,  then  to  cross  the  Kanzam  Pass 
into  the  frightfully  desolate  Shigri  valley,  or  valley  of 
the  Chandra  river;  to  follow  down  that  river  to  its  junc- 
tion with  the  Bhaga;  to  follow  up  the  Bhaga  for  a  few 
marches,  and  then  to  cross  over  the  tremendous  Shinkal 
Pass  on  to  the  Tsarap  Lingti  river,  and  the  valleys 
through  which  streams  flow  into  the  upper  Indus.  It  is 
the  first  portion  of  this  journey  that  I  have  now  to  speak 
of;  and  to  render  it  intelligible,  it  is  only  necessary  for 
the  reader  to  follow  up  the  Spiti  river  as  far  as  he  can 
get,  to  cross  the  mountains  at  its  source,  and  then  to 
descend  the  Chandra  river  to  its  junction  with  the 
Bh.iga. 

At  Kazeh,  a  day's  journey  from  Dankar,  I  left  the 


200  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

usual  track,  which  goes  over  the  Parangla  Pass  to 
Changchemmo  and  Leh,  and  which  involves  a  journey 
that  is  on  many  grounds  objectionable.  Here  I  had  the 
choice  of  two  routes,  one  on  the  left  and  one  on  the  right 
bank  of  the  Lee,  but  chose  the  latter ;  and  as  the  former 
was  within  sight  great  part  of  the  way,  I  had  the  oppor- 
tunity of  observing  that  it  was  considerably  the  worst  of 
the  two,  though  an  inexperienced  traveller  might  rashly 
conclude  that  nothing  could  be  worse  than  the  one  I 
followed.  To  Kazeh  we  kept  up  the  left  bank  of  the 
Lee,  which  was  no  longer  sunk  in  deep  gorges,  but  had 
a  broad  open  valley,  and  spreads  itself  here  and  there 
amid  a  waste  of  white  stones.  Here  I  crossed  the  river, 
at  a  point  where  the  banks  drew  close  together,  and  on 
what,  by  courtesy,  might  be  called  a  wooden  bridge. 
This  sangpa  is  very  high  and  shaky,  and  the  central  por- 
tion of  it  is  composed  of  three  logs,  without  any  parapet, 
and  with  loose  branches  laid  across  it,  which  are  awkward 
and  dangerous  to  step  upon.  Stopping  for  breakfast  at 
the  village  of  Kharig,  I  saw  the  large  Lama  monastery 
of  Ki  on  the  other  side  of  the  river,  perched  on  the  top 
of  a  hill  in  a  very  extraordinary  manner.  This  monas- 
tery, according  to  Csoma  de  Koros,  was  established  in 
the  eleventh  century  of  the  Christian  era  by  a  pupil  of 
the  well-known  Atisha.  It  is  a  celebrated  place;  but 
(whether  or  not  it  contains  any  portion  of  the  dozen 
Spiti  nuns)  its  monks  do  not  seem  to  exercise  much 
civilising  influence  in  their  own  neighbourhood,  for  the 
people  of  Kharig  were  much  more  like  thorough  savages 
than  the  residents  of  any  other  Himaliyan  village  which 
I  entered.  It  being  rather  a  hot  day,  the  children,  and 
even  boys  and  girls  of  ten  and  twelve  years  old,  were 
entirely  naked  ;  and  the  number  of  children  was  far 
beyond  the  usual  proportion  to  that  of  households. 
Morang,  where  we  camped,  is  a  small  village  even  for 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  201 

these  mountains,  and  is  about  13,000  feet  high;  but  it 
had  an  intelligent  and  exceedingly  obliging  mukca — the 
functionary  who  provides  for  the  wants  of  travellers  — 
who  had  been  educated  by  the  Moravian  brethren  in 
Lahaul,  and  spoke  Hindusthani.  There  was  a  wonderful 
view  from  this  place  both  up  and  clown  the  great  valley 
of  the  Spiti  river,  bounded  downwards  by  the  Rupa- 
khago,  or  the  snowy  mountains  of  the  Manerung  Pass, 
and  upwards  by  a  grand  20,000-feet  peak,  supporting  an 
enormous  bed  of  neve.  Both  on  this  day's  journey  and 
on  the  next,  the  banks  of  the  river  and  the  mountains 
above  them  presented  the  most  extraordinary  castellated 
forms.  In  many  parts  the  bed  of  the  Lee  was  hundreds 
of  yards  broad,  and  was  composed  of  white  shingle,  great 
part  of  which  was  uncovered  by  water.  The  steep  banks 
above  this  white  bed  had  been  cut  by  the  action  of  the 
elements,  so  that  a  series  of  small  fortresses,  temples,  and 
spires  seemed  to  stand  out  from  them.  Above  these, 
again,  gigantic  mural  precipices,  bastions,  towers,  castles, 
citadels,  and  spires  rose  up  thousands  of  feet  in  height, 
mocking,  in  their  immensity  and  grandeur,  the  puny 
efforts  of  human  art,  and  yet  presenting  almost  all  the 
shapes  and  effects  which  our  architecture  has  been  able 
to  devise ;  while,  yet  higher,  the  domes  of  pure  white 
snow  and  glittering  spires  of  ice  far  surpassed  in  perfec- 
tion, as  well  as  in  immensity,  all  the  Moslem  musjids 
and  minars.  It  was  passing  strange  to  find  the  inorganic 
world  thus  anticipating,  on  so  gigantic  a  scale,  some 
of  the  loftiest  efforts  of  human  art  ;  and  it  is  far  from 
unlikely  that  the  builders  of  the  Taj  and  of  the  Pearl 
Mosque  at  Agra  only  embodied  in  marble  a  dream  of 
the  snows  of  the  Himaliya  or  of  the  Hindu  Kush. 

After  leaving  Morang,  we  crossed  another  shaky 
sangpa  over  the  Gyundi  river,  and  another  one  before 
reaching  Kiotro,  where  we  encamped  in  a  sort  of  hollow 


202  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

beyond  the  village.  The  place  seemed  shut  in  on  every 
side;  but  that  did  not  preserve  us  from  a  frightful  wind 
which  blew  violently  all  night,  and,  with  the  thermo- 
meter at  430,  rendered  sleep  nearly  impossible  in  my 
tent.  There  was  a  good  path  on  the  left  bank  of  the  Lee 
for  my  next  day's  journey  from  Kiotro  to  Loisar ;  and 
the  rock-battlements  were  more  wonderful  than  ever; 
but  just  before  reaching  that  latter  place,  we  had  to  cross 
to  the  right  bank  of  the  river  by  means  of  a  very  un- 
pleasant jliiila,  the  side-ropes  of  which  were  so  low  as 
to  make  walking  along  it  painful.  In  Loisar,  instead  of 
using  my  tent,  I  occupied  a  small  mud-room  which  the 
Government  of  British  India  has  been  good  enough  to 
erect  for  the  benefit  of  travellers.  I  do  not  know  what 
the  reason  may  be  for  this  unusual  act  of  generosity. 
Perhaps  it  is  because  Loisar  is  one  of  the  highest  villages 
in  the  world,  though  it  is  inhabited  all  the  year  round, 
being  13,395  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea.  Notwith- 
standing this  extreme  altitude,  it  has  a  good  many  fields 
in  which  various  kinds  of  grain  are  cultivated,  and  there 
is  not  a  little  pasture-land  in  its  neighbourhood.  The 
care  of  a  paternal  Government  had  even  gone  the  length 
of  keeping  this  room  clean  and  free  from  insects ;  so  it 
was  a  pleasant  change  from  my  tent,  the  more  so  as  it 
began  to  rain,  and  rain  at  13,395  feet  very  soon  displays 
a  tendency  to  turn  into  sleet  and  snow.  A  tent  is  very 
healthy  and  delightful  up  to  a  certain  point;  but  it 
hardly  affords  any  higher  temperature  than  that  of  the 
external  air;  and  on  these  great  altitudes  at  night  the 
air  cools  down  so  rapidly,  and  to  such  an  extent,  that  it 
may  be  a  source  of  danger  to  some  people.  There  is  a 
safeguard,  however,  in  the  purity  of  the  Himaliyan  air 
and  in  our  continuously  open-air  life  among  the  moun- 
tains. I  have  been  injured  by  the  unusual  severity  of 
the  winter  this  year  in  England ;  yet  got  no  harm,  but 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  203 

rather  positive  benefit,  from  camping  on  snow  for  nights 
together  in  my  thin  tent  in  Zanskar  and  Sum,  and  in 
much  more  severe  weather  than  we  have  had  here  lately. 
Still,  the  paternal  Government's  mud-palace  at  Loisar 
was  an  agreeable  change,  and  afforded  me  the  luxury  of 
a  sounder  sleep  than  I  had  had  for  several  nights.  The 
Nako-wallah,  however,  did  not  at  all  appreciate  the 
advantages  of  having  a  solid  habitation  about  him.  I 
should  have  thought  it  would  have  been  simple  enough 
even  for  his  tastes  ;  but  nothing  would  satisfy  that  fleecy 
dog  until  he  was  allowed  to  lie  outside  of  the  door  instead 
of  inside,  though  that  latter  position  exposed  him  to 
hostile  visits  from  all  the  dogs  of  the  village  ;  and  there 
was  a  ferocious  growling  kept  up  all  night  outside -the 
door,  which,  however,  was  music  to  me  compared  with 
the  howling  of  the  wind  about  my  tent,  to  which  I  had 
been  exposed  for  two  or  three  nights  previously. 

At  Loisar  I  had  to  arrange  for  a  very  hard  journey  of 
five  days,  over  a  wild  stretch  of  country  where  there  are 
no  villages,  no  houses,  and  scarcely  any  wood,  so  that 
supplies  of  every  kind  have  to  be  taken  for  it.  In  order 
to  get  into  Lahaul,  and  hit  the  junction  of  the  Chandra 
and  Bhaga  rivers  on  the  cut  road  which  runs  from  Simla 
to  Leh,  two  routes  are  available  from  Loisar,  both  in- 
volving a  stretch  of  days  over  a  desolate  and  glacier- 
covered  country.  They  both  pursue  the  same  course  for 
nearly  a  day's  journey  on  to  the  gradual  western  slope 
of  the  Kanzam  or  Kanzal  Pass  ;  but  before  crossing  it, 
one  route  takes  off  to  the  right,  up  the  highest  portion  of 
the  valley  of  the  Chandra  river,  until  it  strikes  the  cut 
road  to  Leh,  near  the  top  of  the  Barra  Lacha  Pass 
(16,221  feet),  and  then  descends  the  Bhaga  to  the  junc- 
tion of  the  two  rivers,  along  the  cut  road  and  down  a 
valley  where  there  are  plenty  of  villages.  This  was  the 
road  which  I  wished  to  follow,  because  I  always  pre- 


204  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

ferred  keeping  as  high  up  as  possible  ;  but  the  people  at 
Loisar,  who  were  to  furnish  me  with  coolies,  declared 
against  that  route,  and  implored  me  not  to  insist  upon 
going  by  it.  There  is  a  very  difficult  river  to  be  forded, 
the  water  of  which  is  so  rapid  that  the  bigarries,  or 
porters,  can  only  manage  to  get  through  by  holding  one 
another's  hands  and  forming  a  long  line.  When  Sir 
Douglas  Forsyth  was  Commissioner  of  the  Hill  States, 
he  passed  over  this  route,  losing  two  of  his  bigarries 
(women,  I  think)  in  this  river  ;  and  though  he  com- 
pensated their  families,  this  unfortunate  event  is  ad- 
vanced to  this  day  as  a  conclusive  reason  against  the 
Barra  Lacha  route,  and  will  probably  be  so  advanced  for 
centuries,  if  the  world  lasts  as  long. 

Hence  I  had  to  adopt  the  other  route,  which  proved 
to  be  quite  elevated  and  cold  enough.  It  crosses  the 
Kanzam  Pass  at  a  height  of  almost  15,000  feet,  and 
then  goes  down  the  Chandra  river  on  its  left  bank, 
through  what  is  called  by  the  natives  the  Shigri  valley, 
until  it  reaches  the  cut  road  to  Leh  at  the  foot,  and  on 
the  north  side,  of  the  Rotang  Pass,  which  is  13,000  feet 
high,  and  the  mountains  of  which  separate  Lahaul  from 
the  Kulu  valley.  Immediately  after  that  point,  this 
route  crosses  the  river  to  the  village  of  Kokser.  and  pro- 
ceeds from  thence  to  the  junction  of  the  Chandra  and 
Bhaga,  from  whence  there  are  various,  but  all  rather 
difficult,  routes  leading  to  Kashmir.  The  two  routes  I 
have  mentioned,  which  meet  at  the  head  of  the  Chandra- 
Bhaga — or  what  is  almost  equivalent  to  them,  these  two 
rivers  before  their  junction — enclose  a  large  extent  of 
great  glaciers  and  immense  snowy  mountains,  with  no 
habitations,  and  almost  inaccessible  to  human  beings. 
An  equally  high  range  runs  down  the  left  bank  of  the 
Chandra  (the  route  which  I  followed),  throwing  out  its 
glaciers  down  to  and  almost  across  the  river;  so  that  it 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  205 

may  easily  be  conceived  that  few  portions  even  of  the 
Himaliya,  which  are  at  all  accessible,  afford  such  a  stretch 
of  desolation  and  of  wild  sublimity. 

It  was  necessary  for  me,  on  this  part  of  the  journey, 
to  take  sixteen  bigarries,  nearly  half  of  whom  were 
women,  besides  an  extra  yak  to  carry  wood  ;  and  for  my 
own  use  I  got  a  little  dark  Spiti  mare,  which  looked 
nothing  to  speak  of,  but  actually  performed  marvels. 
We  also  took  with  us  a  small  flock  of  milch  goats,  which 
could  pick  up  subsistence  by  the  way,  and  one  or  two 
live  sheep  to  be  made  into  mutton  on  the  journey. 
Starting  at  six  on  the  morning  of  the  25th  August,  with 
the  thermometer  at  420,  the  first  part  of  the  journey 
gave  no  idea  of  the  desolation  which  was  soon  to  be 
encountered.  The  day  was  bright  and  delightful,  and 
the  air  even  purer  and  more  exhilarating  than  usual,  as 
might  be  expected  above  13,000  feet.  A  (exv  miles  be- 
yond Loisar  we  came  to  the  end  of  the  Lee  or  Spiti 
river,  which  I  had  now  followed  up  from  its  confluence 
with  the  Sutlej,  through  one  of  the  wildest  and  most 
singular  valleys  in  the  world.  Its  whole  course  is  145 
miles ;  but  such  figures  give  no  idea  of  the  time  and 
immense  toil  which  are  required  in  order  to  follow  it  up 
that  short  course,  in  which  it  has  a  fall  of  about  6000 
feet.  It  has  an  extraordinary  end,  which  has  already 
been  described,  and  also  a  curious  commencement  ;  for 
it  begins,  so  to  speak,  at  once,  in  a  broad  white  bed  of 
sand  and  stones,  being  there  created  by  the  junction  of 
two  short  and  (when  I  saw  them)  insignificant  streams, 
of  about  equal  size  and  length  ;  the  Lichu,  which  comes 
from  the  Kanzam  Pass,  and  the  Pitu,  which  has  its  rise 
in  the  20,000  snowy  peak  Kiii.  Earlier  in  the  season, 
however,  just  after  mid-day,  when  the  snows  and 
glaciers  are  in  full  melting  order,  there  must  be  a  mag- 


206  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

nificent  body  of  water  in  this  upper  portion  of  the  Lee, 
raging  and  foaming  along  from  bank  to  brae. 

Turning  south-west,  up  the  Li'chu  river,  we  found  a 
beautiful  valley,  full  of  small  willow-trees  and  bright 
green  grass,  though  it  could  have  been  very  little  less 
than  14,000  feet  high.  It  was  the  most  European-look- 
ing valley  I  saw  among  the  Himaliya  before  reaching 
Kashmir;  and  it  was  followed  by  easy  grassy  slopes, 
variegated  by  sunshine  and  the  shade  of  passing  clouds, 
which  slopes  led  up  to  the  extreme  summit  of  the 
Kanzam  or  Kanzal  Pass,  a  height  of  14,937  feet.  Here 
there  was  a  very  imposing  view  in  front,  of  immense 
glaciers  and  snowy  peaks,  over  or  about  20,000  feet 
high,  which  rose  up  not  far  from  perpendicularly,  on  the 
other  side  of  the  youthful  Chandra  river,  which  raged 
down  far  beneath  our  feet,  in  a  manner  which  made  it 
no  wonder  that  the  Kokser  people  were  unwilling  to 
encounter  its  turbid  current.  These  mountains  are  the 
L  peaks  of  the  Topographical  Survey  ;  three  of  them 
had  some  resemblance  to  the  Matterhorn,  though  with 
more  snow,  and  they  rose  abruptly  from  the  Chandra,  so 
as  in  the  pure  air  to  appear  almost  within  a  stone's-throw 
of  the  place  on  which  we  stood.  Great  overhanging  beds 
of  ncvd  fed  enormous  glaciers,  which  stretched  down  to 
the  river  like  buttresses  of  the  three  nearest  peaks.  To 
an  unpractised  eye,  it  might  have  seemed  as  if  the 
glaciers  extended  only  half-way  to  the  Chandra,  because 
the  lower  portions  of  them  were  not  only  thickly  covered 
with  debris  of  rock,  but  in  some  places  this  debris  bore 
living  grass.  This  is  a  striking  phenomenon,  which 
occurs  on  the  Himaliyan  glaciers  ;  but  I  shall  return  to 
the  subject  directly,  when  I  get  upon  the  great  glaciers 
of  the  Shigri  valley. 

There  was  a  steep  descent  from  the  top  of  the 
Kanzam  Pass  to  the  Chandra  river,  which  we  followed 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  207 

down  a  short  way  until  a  camping-ground  was  found 
about  the  height  of  14,000  feet,  beside  a  sort  of  pond 
formed  by  a  back-flow  of  a  tributary  of  the  Chandra. 
Looking  down  the  valley,  immense  glaciers  were  seen 
flowing  down  the. clefts  in  the  high  mural  precipices  on 
both  sides  of  the  Chandra,  and  extending  from  the  great 
beds  of  snow  above,  down  to,  and  even  into  the  river. 
This  was  the  Abode  of  Snow,  and  no  mistake ;  for 
nothing  else  but  snow,  glaciers,  and  rocks  were  to  be 
seen,  and  the  great  ice-serpents  crept  over  into  this 
dread  valley  as  if  they  were  living  monsters.  In  the 
local  dialect  Shigri  means  a  glacier;  but  the  word  is 
applied  to  the  upper  Chandra  valley  ;  so  that  the  Shigri 
valley  may  be  called,  both  literally  and  •  linguistically, 
the  "Valley  of  Glaciers."  But  the  collection  of  glaciers 
between  the  Chandra  and  Bhaga  rivers,  large  though 
it  be,  is  really  insignificant  compared  to  the  enor- 
mous congeries  of  them  to  be  found  on  the  southern 
side  of  Zanskar.  There  was  no  sward  here  of  any 
description  ;  and  I  began  to  realise  the  force  of  the 
Afghan  proverb,  "When  the  wood  of  Jugduluk  burns 
you  begin  to  melt  gold."  Of  this  Shigri  valley,  in 
which  we  spent  the  next  four  days,  it  may  well  be 
said  that — 

"  Bare  is  it,  without  house  or  track,  and  destitute 
Of  obvious  shelter  as  a  shipless  sea." 

That,  however,  is  by  no  means  the  worst  of  it ;  and 
in  the  course  of  the  afternoon  a  fierce  storm  of  wind, 
rain,  and  snow  added  to  the  savagery  of  the  scene.  As 
I  had  noticed  from  the  top  of  the  pass,  some  of  the 
clouds  of  the  monsoon  seemed  to  have  been  forced 
over  the  two  ranges  of  lofty  mountains  between  us 
and  the  Indian  plains;  and  soon  the  storm-clouds 
began  to   roll  grandly  among  the  snowy  peaks  which 


208  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO  W. 


rose  close  above  us  on  every  side.  That  spectacle 
was  glorious ;  but  it  was  not  so  pleasant  when  the 
clouds  suddenly  descended  upon  us,  hiding  the  peaks, 
and  discharging  themselves  in  heavy  rain  where  we 
were,  but  in  snow  a  few  hundred  feet  above.  There 
was  a  storm-wind,  which  came — 

"  Like  Auster  whirling  to  and  fro, 

His  force  on  Caspian  foam  to  try; 
Or  Boreas,  when  he  scours  the  snow 
That  skims  the  plains  of  Thessaly." 

The  thermometer  sank  at  once  to  410  from  about  650; 
and  during  the  night  it  got  down  to  freezing-point 
within  my  tent.  Before  night  the  clouds  lifted,  show- 
ing new-fallen  snow  all  round  us.  In  the  twilight 
everything  looked  white,  and  assumed  a  ghastly 
appearance.  The  pond  was  white,  and  so  were  the 
stones  around  it,  the  foaming  river,  and  the  chalky 
ground  on  which  our  tents  were  pitched.  The  sides 
of  the  mountains  were  white  with  pure  new-fallen 
snow ;  the  overhanging  glaciers  were  partly  covered 
with  it  ;  the  snowy  peaks  were  white,  and  so  were 
the  clouds,  faintly  illuminated  by  the  setting  sun, 
veiled  with  white  mist.  After  dark,  the  clouds 
cleared  away  entirely,  and,  clearly  seen  in  the  bril- 
liant starlight — 

"  Above  the  spectral  glaciers  shone" 

beneath  the  icy  peaks  ;  while,  above  all,  the  hosts  of 
heaven  gleamed  with  exceeding  brightness  in  the  high 
pure  air.  The  long  shining  cloud  of  the  Milky  Way 
slanted  across  the  white  valley  ;  Vega,  my  star,  was 
past  its  zenith;  and  the  Tsaat  Rishi — the  seven 
prophets  of  the  Hindus,  or  the  seven  stars  of  our 
Great  Bear — were  sinking  behind  the  mountains. 
We  had  some  difficulty  in  getting  off  by  six   next 


SHTGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  209 

morning-,  when  the  thermometer  was  at  360,  and  every 
one  was  suffering  from  the  cold.  Unfortunately,  too, 
we  had  to  ford  several  icy-cold  streams  shortly  after 
leaving  camp,  for  they  would  have  been  unfordable 
farther  on  in  the  day.  There  are  no  bridges  on  this 
wild  route ;  and  I  could  not  help  pitying  the  poor 
women  who,  on  this  cold  morning,  had  to  wade 
shivering  through  the  streams,  with  the  rapid  water 
dashing  up  almost  to  their  waists.  Still,  on  every 
side  there  were  20,000-feet  showy  peaks  and  over- 
hanging glaciers,  while  great  beds  of  snow  curled 
over  the  tops  of  the  mural  precipices.  After  a  few 
miles  the  Chandra  ceased  to  run  from  north  to  south, 
and  turned  so  as  to  flow  from  east  to  west ;  but  there 
was  no  change  in  the  sublime  and  terrific  character 
of  the  scenery.  Out  of  the  enormous  beds  of  snow 
above,  whenever  there  is  an  opening  for  them — 

"  The  glaciers  creep 
Like  snakes  that  watch  their  prey  ;  from  their  far  fountains 
Slowly  rolling  on  ;  there  many  a  precipice, 
Frost,  and  the  sun,  in  scorn  of  mortal  power, 
Have  piled — dome,  pyramid,  and  pinnacle— 
A  city  of  death,  distinct  with  many  a  tower, 
And  wall  impregnable  of  beaming  ice. 
Yet  not  a  city,  but  a  flood  of  ruin 
Is  there,  that  from  the  boundaries  of  the  sky 
Rolls  its  perpetual  stream." 

We  were  soon  doomed  to  make  a  closer  acquaintance 
with  some  of  these  enormous  glaciers.  Ere  long  we 
came  to  one  which  stretched  down  all  the  way  into  the 
river,  so  there  was  no  flanking  it.  At  first  it  looked 
as  if  we  were  painfully  crossing  the  huge  ridges  of  a 
fallen  mountain  ;  but  this  soon  proved  to  be  an  im- 
mense glacier,  very  thickly  covered  over  with  slabs 
of  clay-slate,  and  with  large  blocks  of  granite  and 
gneiss,  but  with  the  solid  ice  underneath  exposed  here 

o 


210  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

and  there,  and  especially  in  the  surfaces  of  the  large 
crevasses,  which  went  down  to  unknown  depths.  This 
glacier,  as  also  others  which  followed,  was  a  frightfully- 
fatiguing'  and  exasperating  thing  to  cross,  and  occu- 
pied us  nearly  three  hours,  our  guides  being  rather  at 
a  loss  in  finding  a  way  over.  I  should  have  been 
the  whole  day  upon  it,  but  for  the  astounding  per- 
formances of  my  little  Spiti  mare,  which  now  showed 
how  wise  had  been  the  selection  of  it  for  this  difficult 
journey.  Never  had  I  before  fully  realised  the  goat- 
like agility  of  these  animals,  and  I  almost  despair  of 
making  her  achievements  credible.  She  sprang  from 
block  to  block  of  granite,  even  with  my  weight  upon 
her,  like  an  ibex.  No  one  who  had  not  seen  the  per- 
formance of  a  Spiti  pony  could  have  believed  it  possible 
for  any  animal  of  the  kind  to  go  over  the  ground  at  all, 
and  much  less  with  a  rider  upon  it.  But  this  mare  went 
steadily  with  me  up  and  down  the  ridges,  over  the  great 
rough  blocks  of  granite  and  the  treacherous  slabs  of 
slate.  I  had  to  dismount  and  walk,  or  rather  climb  a 
little,  only  three  or  four  times,  and  that  not  so  much 
from  necessity  as  from  pity  for  the'little  creature,  which 
was  trembling  in  every  limb  from  the  great  leaps  and 
other  exertions  which  she  had  to  make.  On  these  occa- 
sions she  required  no  one  to  lead  her,  but  followed  us 
like  a  dog,  and  was  obedient  to  the  voice  of  her  owner. 
Shortly  before  coming  to  the  glacier,  I  thought  she  was 
going  over  a  precipice  with  me,  owing  to  her  losing  her 
footing  on  coming  down  some  high  steps  ;  but  she  saved 
herself  by  falling  on  her  knees  and  then  making  a  mar- 
vellous side-spring.  On  the  glacier,  also,  though  she 
sometimes  lost  her  footing,  yet  she  always  managed  to 
recover  it  immediately  in  some  extraordinary  way.  Her 
great  exertions  there  did  not  require  any  goad,  and 
arose  from  her  own  .spirit  and  eager  determination  to 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS!  21  r 

overcome  the  obstacles  which  presented  themselves, 
though  in  ordinary  circumstances  she  was  perfectly- 
placid,  and  content  to  jog  along  as  slowly  as  might  he. 
Even  when  I  was  on  this  mare,  she  would  poise  herself 
on  the  top  of  a  block  of  granite,  with  her  four  feet  close 
together  after  the  manner  of  a  goat,  and  she  leaped 
across  crevasses  of  unknown  depth  after  having  to  go 
down  a  slippery  slope  on  one  side,  and  when,  on  the 
other,  she  had  nothing  to  jump  upon  except  steeply- 
inclined  blocks  of  stone.  The  two  Loisar  yaks  also, 
magnificent  black  creatures  with  enormous  white  tails, 
did  wonders  ;  but  their  indignant  grunting  was  some- 
thing to  hear.  They  had  to  be  goaded  a  good  deal, 
and  were  not  so  surprising  as  the  slender-legged  Spiti 
mare.  Of  course  the  latter  had  no  shoes ;  and  it  is  not 
usual  to  shoe  the  horses  of  the  Himaliya,  though  they  do 
so  sometimes  in  Kashmir;  and  in  Wukhan,  to  the  north 
of  the  Oxus,  there  is  the  curious  compromise  of  shoeing 
them  with  deer's  horn,  which  protects  the  hoofs,  while 
presenting  a  surface  less  slippery  than  iron,  and  one 
more  congenial  to  the  horse's  tender  foot.  There  was 
something  affecting  in  the  interest  which  this  mare  and 
some  of  the  other  mountain  ponies  I  had  elsewhere 
took  in  surmounting  difficulties,  and  not  less  so  in  the 
eagerness,  at  stiff  places,  of  the  foals  which  often  accom- 
panied us  without  carrying  any  burden.  Thus  in  early 
youth  they  get  accustomed  to  mountain  journeys  and  to 
the  strenuous  exertions  which  these  involve.  At  the 
same  time,  the  Himaliyan  ponies  husband  their  breath 
very  carefully  in  going  up  long  ascents,  and  no  urging 
on  these  occasions  will  force  them  to  go  faster  than  they 
think  right,  or  prevent  them  from  stopping  every  now 
and  theri  just  as  long  as  they  think  proper.  These  are 
matters  which  must  be  left  entirely  to  the  ponies  them- 
selves, and  they  do  not  abuse  the  liberty  which  they 


2 1 2  THE  A  B  ODE  OF  SNO  W. 

claim.  More  trying  is  their  fondness  for  trotting  or  am- 
bling down  the  steepest  ascents  on  which  they  can  at  all 
preserve  their  footing  ;  and  they  show  considerable  im- 
patience when  restrained  from  doing  so,  and  have  expres- 
sive ways  of  their  own  of  saying  to  their  rider,  "  Why 
don't  you  trust  me,  and  let  me  go  down  at  my  own  pace  ? 
I  shall  take  you  quite  safely."  This  ambling  down 
a  precipitous  mountain-side  is  particularly  unpleasant 
when  the  path  is  a  corkscrew  one,  with  many  and  sharp 
turnings,  because  when  the  pony  rushes  down  at  a  turn- 
ing, it  seems  as  if  its  impetus  must  carry  it  on  and  over  ; 
but  at  the  last  moment  it  manages  to  twist  itself  round, 
so  that  it  can  proceed  in  another  direction  ;  and  I  think 
these  intelligent  little  creatures  take  a  pride  in  making 
as  narrow  a  shave  of  the  precipice  as  possible,  and  in 
making  their  riders  feel  as  uncomfortable  as  they  can. 
They  are  also  great  in  wriggling  you  round  delicate 
points  of  rock,  where  the  loss  of  half  an  inch  would  send 
both  horse  and  rider  into  the  abyss.  They  do  positively 
enjoy  these  ticklish  places ;  and  the  more  ticklish  the 
place,  and  the  deeper  the  precipice  below,  the  more  do 
they  enjoy  it,  and  the  more  preternaturally  sagacious  do 
they  become.  They  sniff  at  such  a  place  with  delight ; 
get  their  head  and  neck  round  the  turning;  experiment 
carefully  to  feel  that  the  pressure  of  your  knee  against 
the  rock  will  not  throw  the  whole  concern  off  its  balance, 
and  then  they  wriggle  their  bodies  round  triumphantly. 
I  speak  in  this  way,  however,  only  of  the  best  ponies 
of  Spiti  and  Zanskar,  and  not  of  those  of  Lahaul,  or  of 
any  of  the  lower  Himaliyan  provinces,  which  are  much 
inferior. 

While  stopping  for  breakfast  on  this  great  glacier,  the 
ice  beneath  the  stones  on  which  we  were  gave  a  great 
crack,  and  the  stones  themselves  sank  a  little  way.  This 
caused  a  general  removal,  and  it  looked  as  if  we  had 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  213 

seated  ourselves  for  breakfast  over  a  crevasse  (not  a  wise 
thing  to  do),  the  mouth  of  which  had  been  blocked  up 
with  stones.  To  do  Silas  and  Nurdass  justice,  they 
stuck  by  the  breakfast- things,  and  removed  these  also; 
but  that  was,  perhaps,  because  they  did  not  understand 
the  danger  we  were  in.  The  place  had  been  selected 
because  of  its  affording  shelter  from  the  wind  ;  but  when, 
after  the  crack  occurred,  I  examined  it  closely,  I  saw 
quite  clearly  that  we  had  been  sitting  between  the  lips 
of  a  crevasse  which  had  got  blocked  up  with  rocks,  and 
that  the  place  was  eminently  an  unsafe  one.  Our  Loisar 
bigarries  had  a  story  about  the  rocks  on  this  glacier 
having  been  owing  to  the  fall  of  a  mountain-peak  which 
had  formerly  existed  in  the  immediate  neighbourhood. 
Very  possibly  there  may  have  been  a  land-slip  of  the 
kind  ;  but  the  coolies  varied  in  their  legend  about  the 
fall  of  the  peak,  some  saying  that  it  occurred  two  gene- 
rations, and  others  twelve  years  ago.  When  questioned 
on  the  subject,  they  acknowledged  that  the  glacier  must 
move,  because  every  summer  they  had  to  find  a  new 
path  across  it,  and  had  to  erect  fresh  marks  in  order  to 
indicate  the  way.  There  are  so  many  crumbling  peaks 
and  precipices  about  the  great  fountains  of  this  glacier, 
that  there  is  no  absolute  need  for  the  theory  or  legend  of 
the  Loisar  people  to  explain  its  covered  condition.  This 
glacier  clearly  arose  from  a  number  of  large  glaciers 
meeting  in  a  great  valley  above,  filling  that  up,  and  then 
pushing  themselves  over  its  rim  in  one  great  ice-stream 
down  to  the  river  ;  and  the  crumbling  precipices  and 
peaks  around  were  quite  sufficient  to  supply  the  rocks 
we  saw  below.  So  compact  had  the  covering  got,  that 
in  some  places  I  observed  grass  and  flowers  growing  on 
this  glacier.  Coleridge  has  sung  of  the  "  living  flowers 
that  skirt  the  eternal  frost,"  but  here  the  flowers  were 
blooming  on  the  eternal  frost  itself. 


214  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Occasionally,  I  think,  a  living  flower  is  found  en 
Swiss  glaciers,  but  very  rarely  —  whereas  on  the 
Himaliyan,  flowers  are  by  no  means  uncommon;  and 
the  circumstance  is  easily  accounted  for  by  the  greater 
power  of  the  sun  in  the  Himaliyan  regions,  and  also 
by  the  fact,  that  when  the  glaciers  get  down  a  certain 
distance,  they  are  so  thickly  covered  by  shattered  rocks 
that  they  have  to  work  their  way,  as  it  were,  under- 
ground. In  Switzerland,  one  often  sees  the  great 
ploughshare  of  a  glacier  coming  down  into  a  green 
valley  and  throwing  up  the  turf  before  it ;  but  usually 
among  the  Himaliya,  long  before  the  glacier  reaches 
any  green  valley,  it  is  literally  overwhelmed  and  buried 
beneath  the  shattered  fragments  of  rock  from  the 
gigantic  precipices  and  peaks  around.  This  slackens, 
without  altogether  arresting,  its  progress  ;  so  that  in 
many  places  the  debris  is  allowed  sufficient  rest  to 
permit  of  the  growth  of  grass  and  flowers.  It  struck 
me  that  in  some  places  there  were  even  what  might  be 
called  subterranean  glaciers  ;  that  is  to  say,  that  the 
fallen  debris  had  so  fallen  together  and  solidified,  that 
the  ice-s-tream  worked  below  it  without  disturbing  the 
solidified  surface. 

And  here,  as  I  am  well  acquainted  with  the  Alps,  it 
may  not  be  amiss  for  me  to  compare  the  Himaliya  with 
these  European  mountains,  which  are  so  well  known  to 
the  English  public.  The  Himaliya,  as  a  whole,  are  not 
so  richly  apparelled  as  the  Alps.  In  Kashmir,  and  some 
parts  of  the  Sutlej  valley,  and  of  the  valleys  on  their 
Indian  front,  they  arc  rich  in  the  most  glorious  vegeta- 
tion, and  present,  in  that  respect,  a  more  picturesque 
appearance  than  any  parts  of  Switzerland  can  boast 
of;  but  one  may  travel  among  the  great  ranges  of  the 
Asiatic  mountains  for  weeks,  and  even  months,  through 
the  most  sterile  scenes,  without  coming  on  any  of  these 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  215 

regions  of  beauty.  There  is  not  here  the  same  close  union 
of  beauty  and  grandeur,  loveliness  and  sublimity,  which 
is  everywhere  to  be  found  over  the  Alps.  There  is  a 
terrible  want  of  level  ground  and  of  green  meadows 
enclosed  by  trees.  Except  in  Kashmir,  and  about  the 
east  of  Ladak,  there  are  no  lakes.  We  miss  much  those 
Swiss  and  Italian  expanses  of  deep  blue  water,  in  which 
white  towns  and  villages,  snowy  peaks  and  dark  moun- 
tains, are  so  beautifully  mirrored.  There  is  also  a  great 
want  of  perennial  waterfalls  of  great  height  and  beauty, 
such  as  the  Staubbach  ;  though  in  summer,  during  the 
heat  of  the  day,  the  Himaliya  in  several  places  present 
long  graceful  streaks  of  dust-foam. 

The  striking  contrasts  and  the  more  wonderful  scenes 
are  not  crowded  together  as  they  are  in  Switzerland. 
Both  eye  and  mind  are  apt  to  be  wearied  among  the 
Himaliya  by  the  unbroken  repetition  of  similar  scenes 
during  continuous  and  arduous  travel,  extending  over 
days  and  weeks  together ;  and  one  sorely  misses 
Goethe's  Ekschen,  or  the  beautiful  little  corners  of  nature 
which  satisfy  the  eye  and  mind  alike.  The  picture 
is  not  sufficiently  filled  up  in  its  detail,  and  the  con- 
tinuous repetition  of  the  vast  outlines  is  apt  to  become 
oppressive.  The  very  immensity  of  the  Himaliya  pre- 
vents us  from  often  beholding  at  a  glance,  as  among  the 
Alps,  the  wonderful  contrast  of  green  meadows,  darker 
pines,  green  splintered  glaciers,  dark  precipitous  cliffs, 
blue  distant  hills,  white  slopes  of  snow  and  glittering  icy 
summits.  There  are  points  in  the  Sutlej  valley  and  in 
Kashmir  where  something  like  this  is  presented,  and  in 
a  more  overpowering  manner  than  anywhere  in  Europe; 
but  months  of  difficult  travel  separate  these  two  regions, 
and  their  beauty  cannot  be  said  to  characterise  the 
Himaliya  generally.  But  what,  even  in  Switzerland, 
would  be  great  mountains,  are  here  dwarfed  into  insig- 


2i6  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

nificant  hills  ;  and  it  requires  some  time  for  the  eye  to 
understand  the  immense  Himaliyan  heights  and  depths. 
Some  great  rock,  or  the  foot  of  some  precipice,  which  is 
pointed  out  as  our  camping-place  for  the  night,  looks  at 
first  as  if  it  were  only  a  few  hundred  feet  off,  but  after 
hours  of  arduous  ascent,  it  seems  almost  as  far  off  as  ever. 

The  human  element  of  the  Western  mountains  is 
greatly  wanting  in  those  of  the  East ;  for  though  here 
and  there  a  monastery  like  Ki,  or  a  village  like  Dan- 
kar,  may  stand  out  picturesquely  on  the  top  of  a  hill, 
yet,  for  the  most  part,  the  dingy-coloured,  fiat-roofed 
Himaliyan  hamlets  are  not  easily  distinguishable  from 
the  rocks  amid  which  they  stand.  The  scattered  chalets 
and  sen  huts  of  Switzerland  are  wholly  wanting  ;  and. 
the  European  traveller  misses  the  sometimes  bright  and 
comely  faces  of  the  peasantry  of  the  Alps.  I  need 
scarcely  say,  also,  that  the  more  wonderful  scenes  of  the 
Abode  of  Snow  are  far  from  being  easily  accessible,  even 
when  we  are  in  the  heart  of  the  great  mountains.  And 
it  can  hardly  be  said  that  the  cloudland  of  the  Hima- 
liya  is  so  varied  and  gorgeous  as  that  of  the  mountains 
of  Europe,  though  the  sky  is  of  a  deeper  blue,  and  the 
heavens  are  much  more  brilliant  at  night. 

But  when  all  these  admissions  in  favour  of  Switzer- 
land are  made,  the  Himaliya  still  remain  unsurpassed, 
and  even  unapproached,  as  regards  ail  the  wilder  and 
grander  features  of  mountain  scenery.  There  is  no- 
thing in  the  Alps  which  can  afford  even  a  faint  idea 
of  the  savage  desolation  and  appalling  sublimity  of 
many  of  the  Himaliyan  scenes.  Nowhere,  also,  have 
the  faces  of  the  mountains  been  so  scarred  and  riven  by 
the  nightly  action  of  frost  and  the  mid-clay  floods  from 
melting  snow.  In  almost  every  valley  we  see  places 
where  whole  peaks  or  sides  of  great  mountains  have 
very  recently  come  shattering  down;  and  the  thoughtful 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  217 

traveller  must  feel  that  no  power  or  knowledge  he  pos- 
sesses can  secure  him  against  such  a  catastrophe,  or 
prevent  his  bones  being  buried,  so  that  there  would  be 
little  likelihood  of  their  release  until  the  solid  earth  dis- 
solves. And,  though  rare,  there  are  sudden  passages 
from  these  scenes  of  grandeur  and  savage  desolation  to 
almost  tropical  luxuriance,  and  more  than  tropical 
beauty  of  organic  nature.  Such  changes  are  startling 
and  delightful,  as  in  the  passage  from  Dras  into  the 
upper  Sind  valley  of  Kashmir;  while  there  is  nothing 
finer  in  the  world  of  vegetation  than  the  great  cedars, 
pines,  and  sycamores  of  many  of  the  lower  valleys. 

It  is  needless  to  look  in  the  Himaliya  for  a  population 
so  energetic  and  interesting  as  the  Swiss,  the  Vaudois, 
or  the  Tyrolese  ;  and  these  mountains  have  no  women 
whose  attractions  at  all  approach  those  of  the  Italian 
side  of  the  Alps  from  Lugano  eastward,  or  of  the  valleys 
of  the  Engadine  and  the  Tyrol.  The  Tibetan  popula- 
tion is  hardly  abundant  enough,  or  of  sufficiently  strong 
morale,  for  heroic  or  chivalric  efforts,  such  as  have  been 
made  by  the  ancient  Greeks,  the  Swiss,  the  Waldenses, 
the  Scotch  Highlanders,  and  the  mountaineers  of  some 
other  parts  of  Europe,  and  even  of  Asia.  There  are  tra- 
ditions enough  among  the  Himaliya,  but  they  usually 
relate  either  to  the  founding  of  monasteries,  the  destruc- 
tion of  invaders  like  Zorawar  Singh,  whose  forces  had 
been  previously  dispersed  by  the  troops  of  Lassa  ;  or  the 
death  of  travelling  parties  in  snowstorms,  and  from  the 
avalanches  of  snow  or  rock.  Nowhere,  unless  in  the 
vast  cloudy  forms  of  Hindu  mythology,  do  we  meet 
with  traditions  of  heroes  or  sages  of  whom  it  can  be 
said,  that 

"  Their  spirits  wrapt  the  dusky  mountain  ; 
Their  mem'ry  sparkled  o'er  the  fountain  ; 
The  meanest  rill,  the  mightiest  river, 
Rolled  mingling  with  their  fame  for  ever." 


218  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

How  easily  Kashmir,  with  a  European  population, 
night  have  guarded  its  passes  and  preserved  its  inde- 
pendence !  but  it  has  scarcely  ever  made  any  attempt  to 
do  so;  and  the  people  of  Tibet  have  not  shown  much 
more  heroism,  though  they  have  had  abundant  experi- 
ence of  fighting.  The  introduction  of  Budhism  into  this 
elevated  country  was  no  doubt  accomplished  only  by 
means  of  much  self-sacrifice  on  the  part  of  its  early 
missionaries ;  but  the  shadowy  forms  of  that  age  are 
most  indistinctly  seen,  and  have  little  attraction  for  the 
modern  European.  There  is  much  of  interest,  how- 
ever, in  Lamaism  and  in  the  very  peculiar  customs  of 
the  Tibetan  race;  and  I  found  it  impossible  to  move 
among  these  people,  especially  in  the  more  primitive 
parts  of  the  country,  without  contracting  a  great  liking 
for  them,  and  admiration  for  their  honesty,  their  patience, 
and  their  placidity  of  temper,  in  circumstances  which 
must  be  trying  for  these  virtues. 

The  Alps  extend  only  for  about  600  miles,  counting 
their  extreme  length  from  Hungary  to  the  Mediter- 
ranean, and  their  lateral  extent  is  very  narrow;  but  the 
Himaliya  proper  are  at  least  1500  miles  in  length.  They 
are  a  great  deal  more  if  we  add  to  them  the  Hindu  Kush, 
which  really  constitute  only  a  continuation  of  the  range, 
and  their  breadth  is  so  great  that  at  some  points  it  is- 
more  than  half  the  entire  length  of  the  Alps.  If,  as 
Royle  remarks,  we  consider  the  Hindu  Kush  to  be  a 
continuation,  not  so  much  of  the  Kuen-lung,  as  of  the 
Himaliya,  then  these  latter  extend  from  the  equator  (by 
their  branches  into  the  Malay  Peninsula)  to  45  degrees 
of  north  latitude,  and  over  y$  degrees  of  longitude. 
That  is  a  gigantic  space  of  the  earth's  surface,  and 
affords  a  splendid  base  for  the  giant  peaks  which  rise  up 
to  almost  30,000  feet ;  but,  as  I  have  already  hinted, 
there  is  even  more  meaning  than  this,  and  more  pro- 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS:  219 

priety  than  the  Arabs  themselves  understood,  in  their 
phrase,  "The  Stony  Girdle  of  the  Earth,"  because  this 
great  central  range  can  easily  be  traced  from  the  moun- 
tains of  Formosa  in  the  China  Sea  to  the  Pyrenees, 
where  they  sink  into  the  Mediterranean.  This  fact  has 
not  escaped  the  notice  of  geographers ;  and  Dr  Mackay 
especially  has  drawn  attention  to  it  in  his  admirable 
"  Manual  of  Modern  Geography,"  though  he  has  not 
known  the  expressive  phrase  of  his  Arab  predecessors. 
The  Western  Himaliya  are  a  series  of  nearly  parallel 
ranges  lying  from  south-east  to  north-west.  They  are 
properly  the  Central  Himaliya;  the  Hindu  Kush  are 
the  Western  ;  and  what  are  now  called  the  Central  Him- 
aliya are  the  Eastern.  These  are  the  most  obvious  great 
natural  divisions;  but  additional  confusion  is  caused  by 
the  Inner  Himaliya,  or  the  interior  ranges,  being  also 
sometimes  spoken  of  as  the  Central.  It  is  more  usual, 
however,  to  take  the  Pamir  Steppe  as  a  centre,  and  to 
speak  of  the  western  range  as  a  boundary  wall  to  the 
high  tableland  of  Western  Asia,  separating  the  waters 
of  the  Arabian  Gulf  from  those  of  the  Caspian,  the  Black 
Sea,  and  the  Aral.  That  portion  consists  of  the  Hindu 
Kush,  the  Parapomisan  mountains,  the  Elburz,  the  Zag- 
ros  of  Kurdistan,  Ararat  and  the  Armenian  mountains, 
the  Taurus  and  Anti-Taurus;  and  these  are  continued 
through  Europe  in  the  mountains  of  Greece  and  Euro- 
pean Turkey,  the  Alps,  the  Cevennes,  and  the  Pyrenees. 
The  south-eastern  range  runs  from  the  Pamir  to  the 
China  Sea  in  the  Himaliya,  and  in  the  branches  from 
it  which  go  down  into  the  Malay  Peninsula  and  Annam. 
The  eastern  range  goes  nearly  due  east  from  the  Pamir 
to  the  Pacific  in  the  Kuen-lung,  and  in  the  Pe-ling, 
which  separate  the  Yang-tsze  from  the  Yellow  River. 
There  is  also  a  north-east  range,  which  runs  from  the 
Pamir  to  Behring's  Strait,  including  the  Tengu  Tagh, 


220  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

and  several  ranges  in  Siberia  and  Kamtchatka.  But  the 
Himaliya  proper,  with  which  we  are  concerned,  may  be 
said  to  be  enclosed  by  the  Indus,  the  Brahmaputra,  and 
the  great  northern  plain  of  India.  That  is  a  very  simple 
and  intelligible  boundary  line  ;  for  the  two  rivers  rise 
close  together  in,  or  in  the  near  neighbourhood  of,  Lake 
Mansorawar.  In  the  first  part  of  their  course  they  flow 
close  behind  the  great  ranges  of  the  Himaliya,  and 
they  cut  through  the  mountains  at  points  where 
there  is  some  reason  for  considering  that  new  ranges 
commence. 

In  adopting  "The  Abode  of  Snow"  as  the  title  of 
this  work,  I  only  give  the  literal  meaning  of  the  word 
Himaliya,  which  is  a  Sanscrit  word,  and  is  to  be  found 
in  most  of  the  languages  of  India.  It  is  a  compound 
word,  composed  of  /lima,  snow  or  winter,  and  ally  a  or 
aldya,  an  abode  or  place.  Its  component  parts  are 
thus  Hima-aliya  ;  and  as  the  double  a  is  contracted 
into  one,  even  the  infant  philologist  of  modern  times  will 
perceive  the  erroneousness  of  our  ordinary  English  way 
of  pronouncing  the  word  as  "Himalaya."*  The  San- 
scrit word  hima  is  also  sometimes  used  to  signify  the 
moon  and  a  pearl ;  but  even  thus  a  portion  of  its  ori- 

*  We  are  not  quite  so  bad  as  the  French  in  this  respect ;  but,  as  a  gene- 
ral rule,  the  infant  philologist  (and  all  infants  are  in  a  fair  way  of  being 
philologists  nowadays)  will  find  it  pretty  safe  always  to  reverse  the  accents 
which  he  finds  Englishmen  putting  upon  foreign  names.  Even  such  a 
simple  and  obvious  word  as  Brindisi  we  must  turn  into  Brindisi ;  and  it 
is  still  worse  when  we  come  to  give  names  of  our  own  to  localities.  What 
a  descent  from  "The  Abode  of  Snow"  to  "The  Hills"  of  the  Anglo- 
Indians,  even  when  the  latter  phrase  may  come  from  a  rosebud  mouth  ! 
But  that  is  not  so  striking  an  example  of  our  national  taste  as  one  which 
has  occurred  in  Jamaica,  where  a  valley  which  used  to  be  called  by  the 
Spaniards  the  "  Bocaguas,"  or  "  Mouth  of  the  Waters,"  has  been  trans- 
muted by  us  into  "Bog  Walks."  A  still  more  curious  transmutation, 
though  of  a  reverse  order,  occurred  in  Hong-Kong,  in  the  early  days  of 
that  so-called  colony.    There  was  a  street  there  much  frequented  by  sailors, 


SHIGR1  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  221 

ginal  meaning  is  denoted.  No  doubt  this  hima  is  closely 
cognate  with  the  Latin  hiems  and  liibernus,  for  lamer- 
nuts  ;  with  the  Greek  xl(^v  (x€Wa)>  ^ie  Persico-Zend  zim 
and  zima,  and  the  Slavonic  zima,  a  word  used  for  winter. 
As  the  great  Abode  of  the  Gods  is  held  by  the  Hindus 
to  be  in  the  Himaliya,  and  the  word  Himaliya  itself  is 
used  by  them  in  that  sense,  it  is  obvious  that  Himmel, 
the  German  word  for  heaven,  comes  from  the  same 
source;  and  it  is  the  only  instance  I  know  of  in  Euro- 
pean languages  which  takes  in  both  compounds.  This 
must  surely  have  occurred  to  the  lexicographers,  but  I 
have  not  noticed  any  reference  to  it.  It  also  occurs  to 
me  that  the  word  "  Imaus,"  which  Milton  uses  in  the 
third  book  of  "  Paradise  Lost,"  and  which  he  took  from 
Pliny,  may  very  likely  be  from  Jiimas,  another  Sanscrit 
form  used  for  winter  and  for  the  Himaliya.  In  Hindu 
mythology  these  mountains  are  personified  as  the  hus- 
band of  Manaka.  He  was  also  the  father  of  Durga,  the 
great  goddess  of  destruction,  who  became  incarnate  as 
Parvati,  or  the  "  daughter  of  the  mountain,"  in  order  to 
captivate  Siva  and  withdraw  him  from  a  penance  which 
he  had  undertaken  to  perform  in  the  Himaliya.  It  is, 
then,  with  the  god  of  destruction,  and  his  no  less  terrible 
spouse,  that  the  Himaliya  are  more  specially  associated, 
rather  than  with  the  brighter  form  of  Vishnu,  the  Pre- 
server ;  but  the  whole  Hindu  pantheon  are  also  regarded 
as  dwelling  among  the  inaccessible  snowy  peaks  of  these 
inaccessible  mountains.  Neither  Cretan  Ida  nor  Thes- 
salian   Olympus  can  boast  of  such  a  company ;   and, 

in  which  Chinese  dam>els  used  to  sit  at  the  windows  and  greet  the  passers- 
by  with  the  invitation,  "  Come  'long,  Jack  ;"  consequently  the  street  be- 
came known  by  the  name  of  the  "  Come  'long  Street,"  which  in  the 
Chine  e  mouth  was  Kicm  Lting,  or  "  The  Golden  Dragon."  So,  when  the 
streets  were  named  and  placarded,  "  Come  along  Street  "  appeared,  both 
in  Chinese  and  English,  as  the  Street  of  the  Golden  Dragon. 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


looking  up  to  the  snows  of  the  Kailas,  it  may  well  be 
said  that — 

"Every  legend  fair, 
Which  the  supreme  Caucasian  mind 
Carved  out  of  Nature  for  itself,  is  there." 

Being  a  boundary  wall  to  the  Tibetan  and  other  ele- 
vated plains  of  Central  Asia,  the  Himaliya  are  usually 
steep  towards  the  Indian  side,  and  more  gradual  towards 
the  north,  the  strata  dipping  to  the  north-east ;  but  this 
rule  has  many  exceptions,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Kailas 
and  the  lofty  mountains  forming  the  southern  boundary 
of  the  Shigri  valley.  There  the  fall  is  as  abrupt  as  it 
could  well  be  towards  the  north,  and  the  23,000-feet 
Akun  peaks  in  Suru  seem  to  stand  up  like  needles.  The 
statement,  frequently  made,  that  there  is  more  soil  and 
more  springs  on  the  northern  than  on  the  southern  side, 
applies  specially  only  to  that  portion  of  the  exterior 
range  which  runs  from  the  Narkanda  Ghaut  up  to  the 
Kailas.  The  line  of  perpetual  snow  is  very  high  in  the 
Himaliya,  and  its  height  detracts  somewhat  from  their 
grandeur  in  July  and  August,  though  that  increases 
their  savage  appearance.  In  the  western  ranges  it  goes 
up  so  high  as  18,500  on  their  southern,  and  19,000  feet 
on  their  northern  faces  ;  but  this  only  means  that  we 
find  exposed  surfaces  of  rock  at  these  heights,  and  must 
not  be  taken  as  a  literal  rule.  Where  snow  can  lodge, 
it  is  rare  to  find  bare  tracts  above  1 6,000  feet  at  any 
period  of  the  year ;  and  even  in  August  a  snowstorm 
may  cover  everything  down  to  12,000  feet,  or  even 
lower.  There  are  great  beds  of  snow  and  glaciers  which 
remain  unremoved  during  the  summer  far  below  1 8,000 
feet.  In  the  Swiss  Alps  the  line  of  perpetual  snow  is 
8900  feet;  so  there  is  the  enormous  difference  on  this 
point  of  io,OCO  feet  between  the  two  mountain  ranges; 
and  so  it  may  be  conceived  how  intense  must  be  the 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  223 

heat  in  summer  of  the  deeper  valleys  of  the  Himaliya. 
but  in  winter  the  snow  comes  down  in  the  latter  moun- 
tains to  3000  feet,  or  lower  occasionally  ;  so  that  there 
may  be  a  range  of  26,000  feet  of  snow,  instead  of  14,000 
as  among'  the  Alps. 

The  arrest  of  the  clouds  of  the  Indian  south-east  mon- 
soon on  the  outer  range  of  the  Himaliya  combines,  with 
other  causes,  to  create  an  extraordinary  dryness  of  atmo- 
sphere, and  this  aridity  increases  on  the  steppes  beyond. 
Hence,  even  when  the  temperature  may  be  very  low, 
there  is  often  very  little  snow  to  be  deposited,  and  the 
accumulations  on  the  high  mountains  have  been  the 
work  of  ages.  It  has  often  been  observed,  in  polar  and 
mountainous  regions,  how  great  is  the  power  of  solar 
rays  passing  through  highly  rarefied  air;  and  upon  the* 
great  heights  of  the  Himaliya,  the  effect  of  these  rays  is 
something  terrible.  When  they  are  reflected  from  new- 
fallen  snow,  their  power  is  so  intense,  that  I  have  seen 
them  raise  my  thermometer  (when  placed  at  a  particular 
angle  against  a  great  sheet  of  sun-lit  snow,  and  exposed 
at  the  same  time  to  the  direct  rays  of  the  sun)  from  a 
little  above  freezing-point,  which  was  the  temperature 
of  the  air,  to  1920  Fahrenheit,  or  between  the  points  at 
which  spirits  boil  and  water  boils  at  the  level  of  the  sea. 
It  is  remarkable  that  in  spite  of  this,  and  though  snow- 
blindness  is  often  the  result,  yet  no  cases  of  sunstroke 
appear  to  occur  in  the  Himaliya,  and  supports  the  theory 
that  sunstroke  partakes  more  of  the  character  of  heat- 
apoplexy  than  of  mere  injury  to  the  head  in  the  first 
instance.  The  difference  of  temperature  between  the 
days  and  nights  is  not  such  as  might  be  expected  from 
the  extremely  rapid  radiation  of  heat  there  is  at  high 
altitudes.  The  change  arising  from  that  cause  would  be 
almost  killing  were  it  not  for  the  fortunate  fact  that  the 
atmosphere  forced  up  by  the  warmth  of  the  day  descends 


224  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

at  night,  and,  being  condensed,  gives  out  heat.  The 
cold  of  the  Himaliya  has  been  known  suddenly  to  kill 
people  when  they  were  exposed  to  sudden  gusts  of  wind, 
though  they  could  safely  have  borne  a  much  lower  tem- 
perature in  still  air.  The  wind  is  certainly  the  great 
drawback  both  to  health  and  comfort  among  these  great 
mountains;  but,  as  we  have  seen,  it  has  its  advantage, 
being  caused  by  the  elevation  of  heated  air  from  below, 
which  afterwards  descending  and  contracting,  renders 
the  nights  endurable.  I  understand  that  the  monks  of 
St  Bernard,  who  go  up  to  that  monastery  at  eighteen 
years  of  age,  vowed  to  remain  there  for  fifteen  years, 
only  in  rare  instances  are  able  to  remain  so  long,  and 
that  does  not  say  much  for  high  mountain  air  ;  but  it 
may  be  the  seclusion  of  their  life  up  there,  and  other 
defects  in  it,  which  makes  that  life  so  injurious  to  them. 
If  any  one  would  allow  me  a  thousand  a  year  on  condi- 
tion that  I  always  keep  above  I2.COO  feet,  I  should  be 
happy  to  make  the  experiment,  and  to  write  a  warm 
obituary  notice  of  my  benefactor  when  he  dies  below. 

But  to  return  to  the  Shigri  valley  :  my  second  camp- 
ing-place there  was  destitute  of  wood,  but  it  was  very 
grassy  and  sheltered.  The  bigarrics  had  the  advantage 
of  an  immense  stone  under  which  there  were  small  hol- 
lows for  them  to  sleep  in  ;  and  there  was  good  water 
accessible,  which  is  often  a  difficulty  ;  because  though 
there  may  be  "  water,  water  everywhere"  about  in  those 
regions,  both  in  a  solid  and  a  liquid  shape,  it  does  not 
necessarily  follow  that  it  can  be  easily  got  at;  for  you 
may  have  to  descend  a  precipice  of  a  thousand  feet  in 
order  to  get  at  the  river,  or  to  ascend  as  high  to  reach 
the  glacier,  which  ceases  to  give  out  streams  towards 
evening.  At  three  r.M.,  the  thermometer  was  so  low  as 
40°,  though  during  the  day  there  had  been  a  blazing 
sun  and  no  clouds.     From  this  spot,  on  the  third  day, 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  225 


the  road  was  literally  frightful,  not  so  much  in  the  sense 
of  being  dangerous  as  exasperating.  It  chiefly  went 
over  great  stones,  with  scarcely  the  "affectation  even  of 
a  track.  Sometimes  it  followed  the  bed  of  the  Chan- 
dra, anon  ascended  the  steep  stony  or  precipitous  banks 
of  that  river,  and  wound  along  the  edge  of  precipices  on 
paths  fit  only  for  deer  or  goats.  We  had  to  ford  quite 
a  number  of  cold  streams,  which  did  not  fail  to  evoke 
plaintive  cries  from  the  women,  and  crossed  at  the  foot 
of  several  glaciers,  which  did  not  appear  to  descend 
quite  to  the  river,  but  very  possibly  did  so,  because  I 
had  neither  time  nor  patience  for  close  examination,  and 
the  shattered  debris  I  several  times  crossed  might  well 
have  had  ice  beneath.  It  was  necessary  to  dismount 
and  scramble  on  foot  every  now  and  then ;  and  nine 
continuous  hours  of  this  sort  of  thing  were  too  much  for 
an  invalid.  The  Spiti  pony  could  be  trusted  almost 
implicitly;  but  many  of  the  ascents  were  too  much  for 
it  with  a  rider.  Riding  among  the  great  stones  endan- 
gered one's  knees,  and,  on  some  of  the  high  paths,  there 
was  not  room  for  it  to  pass  with  a  rider.  And  if  the 
pony  could  be  trusted,  not  so  could  its  saddle,  which 
very  nearly  brought  us  both  to  grief.  We  came  to  some 
high  steps — that  is  to  say,  large  stones  lying  so  as  to 
make  natural  steps,  each  about  two.and  a  half  or  three 
feet  high  —  leading  down  upon  a  narrow  rock  ledge, 
which  ran  (above  a  precipice)  slightly  turned  inwards 
from  the  line  of  descent.  It  was  madness  to  ride  down 
here;  but  I  had  been  so  worried  by  the  fatigue  of  the 
road,  and  by  constant  mounting  and  dismounting,  that 
I  preferred  doing  so,  and  the  pony  quite  justified  my 
confidence.  But  at  the  most  critical  moment,  when  it 
stepped  with  both  feet  from  the  last  stone  on  to  the 
ledge,  when  I  was  leaning  back  to  the  very  utmost,  and 
everything  was  at  the  highest  strain,  then,  just  as  its 

p 


226  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

feet  struck  the  rock,  the  crupper  gave  way,  and  the 
saddle  slipped  forward  on  the  pony's  neck,  throwing  us 
both  off  our  balance.  We  must  have  both  gone  over 
hundreds  of  feet  had  not  a  preservative  instinct  enabled 
me  to  throw  myself  off  the  saddle  upon  the  ledge  of 
rock.  This  movement,  of  course,  was  calculated  to  send 
the  pony  outwards,  and  all  the  more  surely  overboard  ; 
but  in  falling  I  caught  hold  of  its  mane,  pulled  it  down 
on  the  top  of  me,  and  held  it  there  until  some  of  the 
bigarries  came  to  our  release.  A  short  time  elapsed 
before  they  did  so,  and  the  little  pony  seemed  quite  to 
understand,  and  acquiesce  in,  the  necessity  of  remaining 
still.  I  was  riding  alone  at  the  time  of  the  accident, 
and,  had  we  gone  over,  should  probably  not  have  been 
missed  at  the  time,  or  found  afterwards.  Nor  can  I 
exactly  say  that  it  was  I  myself  who  saved  us  both,  be- 
cause there  was  not  an  instant's  time  for  thought  in  the 
matter.  All  I  know  is,  that  it  was  done,  and  that  I  was 
a  good  deal  bruised  and  stiffened  by  the  fall.  I  had  to 
lie  down,  quite  exhausted  and  sore,  whenever  I  reached 
our  third  day's  camping-ground,  which  was  a  very  ex- 
posed, dusty,  and  disagreeable,  one. 

Next  morning  I  did  not  start  till  eight,  and  ordered 
all  the  bigarries  to  keep  behind  me,  as  I  was  afraid  of 
their  pushing  on  to  Kokser,  a  distance  which  would  have 
been  too  much  for  me.  The  road  in  many  places  was 
nearly  as  bad  as  that  of  the  previous  day,  and  there  were 
dangerous  descents  into  deep  ravines  ;  "but  in  part  it 
was  very  pleasant,  running  high  above  the  river  over 
rounded  hills  covered  with  flowery  grass.  The  way  was 
also  enlivened  by  flocks  of  sheep,  some  laden  with  salt, 
and  by  very  civil  shepherds  from  Kulu  and  Bussahir. 
The  usual  camping-ground  was  occupied  by  large  flocks, 
and,  for  the  sake  of  shelter,  I  had  to  camp  close  above 
a  precipice.     Here  I  purchased  from  the  Kulu  shepherds 


SHIGRT  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  227 

a  wonderful  young  dog  called  Djeola,  a  name  which, 
with  my  Indian  servants  and  the  public  in  general,  very 
soon  got  corrupted  into  Julia.  This  animal  did  not 
promise  at  first  to  be  any  acquisition.  Though  only 
five  or  six  months  old,  it  became  perfectly  furious  on 
being  handed  over  to  me  and  tied  up.  I  fastened  it  to 
my  tent-pole,  the  consequence  of  which  was  that  it  tore 
the  drill,  nearly  pulled  the  tent  down,  hanged  itself 
until  it  was  insensible,  and  I  only  got  sleep  after  some- 
how it  managed  to  escape.  I  recovered  it,  however, 
next  morning  ;  and  after  a  few  days  it  became  quite 
accustomed  to  me  and  affectionate.  Djeola  was  a 
source  of  constant  amusement.  I  never  knew  a  dog 
in  which  there  was  so  fresh  a  spring  of  strong  simple 
life.  But  the  curious  thing  is,  that  it  had  all  the  appear- 
ance of  a  Scotch  collie,  though  considerably  larger  than 
any  of  these  animals.  Take  a  black-and-tan  collie, 
double  its  size,  and  you  have  very  much  what  "Julia" 
became  after  he  had  been  a  few  months  in  my  posses- 
sion, for  when  I  got  him  he  was  only  five  or  six  months 
old.  The  only  differences  were  that  the  tail  was  thicker 
and  more  bushy,  the  jaw  more  powerful,  and  he  had 
large  dew  claws  upon  his  hind  feet.  Black  dogs  of  this 
kind  are  called  sussa  by  the  Tibetans,  and  the  red 
species,  of  which  I  had  a  friend  at  Pu,  are  mustang.  The 
wild  dog  is  said  to  go  up  to  the  snow-line  in  the 
Himaliya,  and  to  hunt  in  packs;  but  I  never  saw  or 
heard  of  any,  and  I  suspect  their  habitat  is  only  the 
Indian  side  of  the  Himaliya.  Such  packs  of  dogs 
undoubtedly  exist  on  the  Western  Ghauts  of  India, 
and  they  are  not  afraid  of  attacking  the  tiger,  over- 
coming it  piecemeal,  while  the  enraged  lord  of  the 
forest  can  only  destroy  a  small  number  of  his  assail- 
ants ;  but  very  little  is  really  known  about  them.  An 
interesting  field   for  the    zoologist   is   still   open  in  an 


228  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

examination  of  the  wild  dog  of  Western  India,  the  wild 
ass,  yak,  and  horse  of  Tibet,  and  the  wild  camel,  which 
is  rumoured  still  to  exist  in  the  forests  to  the  east 
of  Yarkund.  I  mentioned  this  latter  animal  to  Dr 
Stolicska,  who  had  not  heard  of  it,  and  thought  that 
such  camels  would  be  only  specimens  of  the  domestic 
species  which  had  got  loose  and  established  themselves, 
with  their  progeny,  in  the  wilderness  ;  but  the  subject  is 
worthy  of  investigation  from  a  scientific  point  of  view  ; 
and  perhaps  the  Yarkund  Mission  may  have  brought 
back  some  information  in  regard  to  it. 

But  though  Djeola  was  most  savage  on  being  tied 
up  and  transferred  to  a  new  owner,  there  was  nothing 
essentially  savage,  rude,  brutish,  or  currish  in  its  nature. 
Indeed  it  very  soon  reminded  me  of  the  admirable  words 
of  one  of  the  most  charming  of  English  writers  upon 
dogs  :  "  Take  an  example  of  a  Dogy,  and  mark  what 
generosity  and  courage  he  will  put  on  when  he  is  main- 
tained by  a  man  who  to  him  is  instead  of  a  god  or 
Melior  Natura."  It  not  only  became  reconciled  to  me, 
but  watched  over  me  with  an  almost  ludicrous  fidelity, 
and  never  got  entirely  reconciled  even  to  my  servants. 
The  striking  my  tent  in  the  morning  was  an  interference 
with  its  private  property  to  which  it  strongly  objected, 
and  if  not  kept  away  at  that  time,  it  would  attack  the 
bigarries  engaged.  I  also  found,  on  getting  to  Kashmir, 
that  it  regarded  all  Sahibs  as  suspicious  characters,  to 
be  laid  hold  of  at  once  ;  but,  fortunately,  it  had  a  way 
of  seizing  them  without  doing  much  damage,  as  it  would 
hold  a  sheep,  and  the  men  it  did  seize  were  good-natured 
sportsmen.  It  delighted  in  finding  any  boy  among  our 
bigarries  that  it  could  tyrannise  over,  but  never  really 
hurt  him.  It  was  very  fond  of  biting  the  heels  of  yaks 
and  horses,  and  then  thinking  itself  ill-treated  when 
they  kicked.     Its  relations  with  Nako  were  also  amus- 


SHIGRI  AND  ITS  GLACIERS.  229 

ing.  That  old  warrior  had  no  jealousy  of  Djcola,  and 
treated  it  usually  with  silent  contempt,  unless  it  drew 
near  when  he  was  feeding — a  piece  of  temerity  which 
the  young  dog  soon  learned  the  danger  of.  But  Djeola 
would  sometimes  indulge  in  gamesome  and  affection- 
ate fits  towards  Nako,  which  the  latter  never  invited, 
and  barely  tolerated,  and  which  usually  resulted  in  a 
short  and  sharp  fight,  in  which  Dje61a  got  speedily 
vanquished,  but  took  its  punishment  as  a  matter  of 
course,  and  without  either  fear  or  anger.  I  had 
intended  this  Himaliyan  giant  sheep-dog  for  the 
admirable  writer  and  genial  sage,  Dr  John  Brown, 
who  has  given  us  "  Rab  and  his  Friends,"  who 
would  have  been  able  to  do  justice  to  its  merits, 
and  compare  it  with  the  sheep-dogs  of  Scotland, 
but  could  not  arrange  that  conveniently,  and  left  it 
with  a  friend  at  Puna. 

When  in  the  Shigri  valley,  I  kept  a  watch  for  any 
symptoms  of  gold,  but  did  not  notice  any,  and  on 
other  grounds  should  not  think  it  likely  that  gold 
exists  there  in  any  quantity.  But  Mr  Theodor,  a 
German  employed  in  carrying  out  the  construction 
of  the  road  over  the  Barra  Lacha  Pass,  told  me  that 
he  had  found  silver  ore  in  this  valley.  I  may  men- 
tion that  the  first  great  glacier  which  I  crossed  has 
pushed  its  way  into  the  Chandra,  and  threatens  to 
close  up  that  river  in  a  very  serious  manner,  as  it 
once  did  before,  which  might  lead  to  disasters  in  the 
valleys  of  the  Chandra- Bhaga  and  of  the  Chenab, 
similar  to  those  which  occurred  in  the  Drance  and 
Upper  Rhone  valleys  of  Switzerland  in  1595  and 
1819. 


CHAPTER    VII. 

ZANSKAR, 

I  SHALL  touch  very  briefly  indeed  upon  Lahaul,  in  order 
to  pass  almost  at  once  into  the  more  secluded  and  inte- 
resting province  which  affords  the  subject  and  the  title 
of  this  chapter.  Lahaul  is  pretty  well  known,  being 
traversed  every  year  by  Himaliyan  tourists  on  their  way 
to  Ladak.  If  we  were  to  take  it  for  a  Hindusthani 
word  (a  subject  on  which  I  have  no  information),  the 
proper  translation  of  it  would  be  "a  howling  wilder- 
ness ;"  and  that  is  exactly  what  Lahaul  is  in  one  respect 
important  for  travellers.  As  compared  with  other  parts 
of  the  Himaliya,  it  is  far  from  being  a  howling  wilder- 
ness in  any  physical  sense  of  these  words,  because  it  is 
comparatively  rich  in  trees  and  fields,  and  among  the 
inner  Himaliya  the  valleys  are  much  more  open  than  in 
the  outer,  where  it  is  too  often  impossible  to  see  the 
mountains  because  of  the  mountains.  After  the  scenery 
around,  there  is  a  delightful  sense  of  relief  in  entering  its 
more  open  valleys  and  getting  pretty  full  views  of  the 
great  snowy  ranges  ;  there  is  also  comfort  in  travelling 
along  a  cut  road,  however  narrow  it  may  be  :  but  these 
advantages  are  counterbalanced  by  the  disposition  of 
the  Lahaulese  towards  travellers,  which  is  so  bad  that 
the  tourist  requires  to  be  forewarned  of  it.  There  is, 
however,  a  great  set-off  to  that  in  the  presence  of  the 
Moravian  missionaries,  who  at  Kaelang  have  created  an 
oasis  amidst  the  squalor  and  wildness  of  this  Himaliyan 
province,  and  have  done  as  much  for  its  improvement  as 


ZANSKAR.  231 


the  difficult  circumstances  of  their  position  would  allow. 
A  Yarkund  merchant  had  complained  bitterly  to  me  of 
the  exactions  and  other  annoyances  which  he  was  ex- 
periencing in  Lahaul ;  and  this,  conjoined  with  my  own 
experience — which  I  found  afterwards  to  be  in  accord- 
ance with  that  of  other  English  travellers,  some  of  high 
official  position  —  induced  me  to  inquire  of  the  Moravians 
the  cause  of  such  a  state  of  matters,  which  presents  a 
serious  obstacle  to  the  development  of  trade  between 
Yarkund  and  British  India.  One  reason  they  assigned 
was,  that  the  people  of  Lahaul  were  irritated  at  the 
making  of  the  cut  road,  which  allowed  ponies  and  mules 
to  traverse  their  province,  and  so  deprived  them,  not 
merely  of  their  rights  of  porterage,  but  also  of  certain 
vested  rights  of  pilfering  from  packages,  which  they 
valued  much  more.  Another  reason  assigned  was  the 
hostility  of  the  Tscho,  or  larger  zemindars  ;  but  I 
believe  the  difficulty  is  intimately  connected  with  the 
general  position  assumed  by  the  British  Government. 
It  has  been  so  successfully  instilled  into  the  minds  of 
the  people  by  the  Tscho  that  the  British  rule  will  come 
to  an  end,  that  when  the  Moravians  purchased  some 
land  at  Kaelang  a  few  years  ago,  they  could  only  obtain 
it  on  the  condition  being  formally  inserted  in  the  title- 
deed,  that  it  should  revert  to  the  original  owners  when- 
ever British  rule  came  to  an  end  in  Lahaul.  A  fact  like 
this  hardly  requires  comment,  and  I  may  leave  it  to 
speak  for  itself.  I  shall  only  mention  further,  in  general 
•connection  with  this  province,  that  at  Gandla,  and  still 
better,  about  half-way  on  the  road  to  it  from  Si'su,  mag- 
nificent avalanches  of  snow  may  be  both  heard  and  seen. 
On  the  opposite  side  of  the  Chandra  river  there  rises,  to 
the  height  of  20,356  feet,  the  extremely  precipitous  peak 
M  of  the  Trigonometrical  Survey ;  and  from  the  great 
beds  of  snow  upon  it,  high  above  us,  avalanches  were 


232  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

falling  ever}'  five  minutes,  before  and  after  mid-day,  on 
to  two  long  glaciers  which  extended  almost  down  to  the 
river.  As  the  bed  of  the  Chandra  is  here  under  10,000 
feet,  the  highest  peak  must  have  risen  up  almost  sheer 
more  than  10,000  feet,  in  tremendous  precipices,  hanging 
glaciers,  and  steep  beds  and  walls  of  snow  ;  though  on 
its  north-western  shoulder  the  ascent  was  more  gradual, 
and  was  covered  by  scattered  pines.  Immediately  in 
front  the  slope  was  terrific  ;  and,  every  few  minutes,  an 
enormous  mass  of  snow  gave  way,  and  fell,  flashing  in 
the  sunlight,  on  steep  rocks.  A  great  crash  was  heard 
as  these  masses  struck  the  rocks,  and  a  continuous  roar 
as  they  poured  downwards,  until  they  broke  over  a  preci- 
pice above  the  glaciers,  and  then  fell  with  a  resemblance 
to  great  cataracts  of  white  foaming  water,  and  sending 
up  clouds  of  snow-spray  as  they  struck  the  ice.  The 
volume  of  one  of  these  avalanches  must,  so  long  as  it 
lasts,  be  greater  than  that  of  any  known  cataract,  though 
they  descend  thousands  of  feet,  and  their  final  thun- 
dering concussion  is  as  the  noise  of  many  waters  in  the 
solitudes  around.  "They,  too,  have  a  voice,  yon  piles  of 
snow;"  and  truly  these  are — 

"  Sky-pointing  peaks, 
Oft  from  whose  feet  the  mighty  avalanche 
Shoots  downward,  glittering  through  the  pure  serene." 

From  the  junction  of  the  Chandra  and  Bhaga  rivers 
the  pilgrim  has  the  choice  of  several  routes  to  Kashmir, 
but  they  are  all  of  such  a  character  that  even  Hopeful 
might  be  excused  for  contemplating  them  with  some 
dismay.  The  easiest,  undoubtedly,  is  that  by  Leh ;  but 
it  is  much  the  longest  and  dreariest,  involving  thirty- 
seven  marches  to  Srinagar,  and  an  18,000- feet  pass, 
besides  several  more  of  lesser  height.  A  shorter,  and,  on 
the  whole,  a  much  easier  road,  goes  by  way  of  Chamba 


ZANSKAR.  233 


and  Badrawar ;  but  the  difficulty  is  how  to  get  into 
it,  because  (not  to  speak  of  a  jhida  over  the  Chandra, 
which  beats  all  the  bridges  I  ever  saw,  and  the  mere 
sight  of  which  makes  the  blood  run  cold)  the  best  way 
into  it  is  across  the  fearful  Barra  Bhagal  Pass,  over 
which  beasts  of  burden  cannot  cross,  and  where  there  is 
a  dangerous  arr$tt  which  can  only  be  passed  with  the 
aid  of  ropes.  The  usual  route  taken  is  that  in  twenty- 
seven  marches,  down  the  Chandra-Bhaga  river  to  Kisht- 
war.  But  though  that  route  has  been  improved  of  late 
years,  there  is  one  part  of  it  which  is  impassable  for 
mountain  ponies,  and  it  involves  a  descent  to  5000  feet 
down  a  close  warm  valley.  So  I  set  to  inquire  whether 
my  old  idea  of  following  the  lie  of  the  Himaliya,  and 
always  in  its  loftier  valleys,  could  not  be  carried  out 
on  this  part  of  my  journey  ;  and  was  delighted  to  hear 
from  Mr  Heyde,  the  accomplished  head  of  the  Moravian 
Mission,  that  it  was  quite  passable  ;  that  he  himself  had 
traversed  about  the  first  half  of  the  way,  and  that  it 
led  through  Zanskar,  a  country  of  the  very  existence  of 
which  I  was  then  as  ignorant  as  my  readers  probably 
are  now.  Mr  Heyde  was  quite  enthusiastic  in  praise  of 
this  route,  and  he  even  spoke  of  its  leading  over  flowery 
viaidans  or  plains.  I  am  bound  to  say,  however,  for  the 
benefit  of  future  travellers,  that  this  was  a  delusion  and 
a  snare.  Men  who  have  lived  for  many  years  among  the 
Himaliya  come  to  have  very  peculiar  ideas  as  to  what 
constitutes  a  maidan  or  plain.  There  were  no  diffi- 
culties on  this  route?  I  inquired.  Oh,  there  were  none 
to  speak  of,  except  the  Shinkal  Pass,  which  led  over  into 
Zanskar.  It  was  of  unknown  height;  it  required  four 
days  to  cross  it ;  there  were  no  villages  or  houses  on  the 
way,  and  the  top  of  it  was  an  immense  glacier.  He  (Mr 
Heyde)  had  once  crossed  it  in  company  with  Brother 
Pagell,  and  Brother  Pagell  had  fainted  whenever  they 


234  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

got  off  the  glacier.  But  there  had  been  snow  on  the 
ground,  which  was  very  fatiguing  ;  and  at  the  end  of  the 
fourth  day  I  would  descend  upon  Kharjak,  the  first  village 
in  Zanskar,  which  I  would  find  to.  be  a  nice  hospitable 
place,  about  14,000  feet  high.  Were  there  other  passes? 
Well,  there  was  the  Pense-la  Pass,  but  that  was  nothing. 
A  flowery  mdidan  led  up  to  it  (my  experience  was  that 
a  glacier  and  six  feet  deep  of  snow  led  up  to  the  top  of 
it) ;  but  he  did  not  know  farther,  and  there  might  be 
places  a  little  difficult  to  get  over  between  Surii  and 
Kashmir.  I  mention  this  to  show  how  regular  Hima- 
liyans  look  upon  such  matters  ;  for  Mr  Heyde  was 
careful  to  warn  me  about  the  lateness  of  the  season,  to 
inquire  into  the  state  of  my  lungs  and  throat,  and  to 
give  me  all  the  information  and  assistance  he  could.  It 
took  me  exactly  twenty-eight  marches  and  thirty-one 
days  to  reach  Srinagar  from  Kaelang  by  this  route,  and 
it  could  not  well  be  done  in  less  ;  but  my  difficulties 
were  much  increased  by  a  great  snowstorm  which  swept 
over  the  Himaliya  in  the  middle  of  September,  and 
which  need  not  be  counted  on  so  early  in  the  season. 

The  selection  of  this  route  nearly  caused  a  mutiny 
among  my  servants,  who  had  been  promising  themselves 
the  warm  valley  of  the  Chandra-Bhaga.  So  unknown  a 
country  as  Zanskar  frightened  them,  and  Silas  unfor- 
tunately heard  of  Mr  Pagell's  fainting  fit,  which  almost 
made  the  eyes  start  out  of  his  own  head,  since  he  knew 
that  gentleman's  endurance  as  a  mountaineer.  The  only 
doubt  I  had  was  about  the  weather,  which  began  to  look 
threatening  ;  but  I  finally  resolved  on  this  interesting 
route,  and  found  good  cause  to  congratulate  myself  on 
having  done  so. 

On  the  3d  September  I  took  farewell  of  Brothers 
Heyde  and  Redslob,  the  Moravian  missionaries,  of  their 
kind  ladies,  and  of  Mr  Theodor,  who  was  suffering  in- 


ZANSKAR.  235 


tensely  from  the  exposure  he  had  incurred  in  constructing 
the  road  to  Leh  over  the  Barra  Lacha.  It  was  cold  and 
gloomy  the  day  I  left  Kaelang.  The  clouds  that  hung 
about  the  high  mountains  added  to  the  impressiveness 
of  the  scene.  Through  their  movements  an  icy  peak 
would  suddenly  be  revealed  for  9  few  moments  ;  then  a 
rounded  snowdome  would  appear,  to  be  followed  by 
some  huge  glacier,  looking  through  the  clouds  as  if  it 
were  suspended  in  the  gloomy  air.  For  two  days  we  pur- 
sued the  road  to  Leh — namely,  to  the  village  of  Darcha> 
from  which  the  path  over  the  great  Shinkal  Pass  into 
Zanskar  diverges  to  the  left,  or  north-west,  up  the  valley 
of  the  Kado  Tokpho  river.  This  was  the  last  human 
habitation  before  reaching  Kharjak,  four  days'  journey 
off;  and  though  the  most  of  my  coolies  had,  by  Mr 
Heyde's  advice,  been  engaged  at  Kaelang  to  take  me  as 
far  as  Kharjak,  their  number  had  to  be  supplemented 
at  Darcha.  To  secure  that,  a  representative  of  British 
authority,  a  policeman  so  called,  had  been  sent  with  me 
to  Darcha ;  but  the  policeman  soon  came  back  to  my 
tent  in  a  bruised  and  bleeding  condition,  complaining 
that  the  people  of  the  village  had  given  him  a  beating 
for  his  interference  ;  and  the  men  who  did  engage  to  go, 
tried  to  run  away  when  we  were  well  up  the  desolate 
pass,  and  gave  me  other  serious  trouble.  The  first  day 
of  our  ascent  was  certainly  far  from  agreeable.  The 
route — for  it  would  be  absurd  to  speak  of  a  path — ran 
up  the  left  bank  of  the  Kado  Tokpho,  and  crossed  some 
aggravating  stone  avalanches.  My  dandy  could  not  be 
used  at  all,  and  I  had  often  to  dismount  from  the  large 
pony  I  had  got  at  Kaelang.  Our  first  camping-ground 
was  called  Dakmachen,  and  seemed  to  be  used  for  that 
purpose,  but  had  no  good  water  near.  On  great  part  of 
the  next  day's  journey,  granite  avalanches  were  also  a 
prominent  and  disgusting  feature.     Indeed,  there  are  so 


236  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

many  of  them  in  the  Kado  Tokpho  valley,  and  they 
are  so  difficult  and  painful  to  cross,  that  I  was  almost 
tempted  to  wish  that  one  would  come  down  in  my  pre- 
sence, and  let  me  see  what  it  could  do.  They  were  very 
like  Himdliyan  glaciers,  but  had  no  ice  beneath  ;  and  an 
appalling  amount  of  ifhmense  peaks  must  have  fallen 
down  into  this  hideous  valley.  An  enterprising  dhirzie 
or  tailor,  well  acquainted  with  the  route,  was  our  guide, 
and  the  owner  of  my  pony,  and  I  could  not  help  asking  him 
if  this  were  one  of  the  maidans  of  which  Mr  Heyde  had 
spoken  ;  but  he  said  we  should  meet  one  presently,  and 
found  one  wherever  there  was  a  narrow  strip  of  grassy 
land.  At  one  place  we  had  to  work  up  the  side  of  a  sort 
of  precipice,  and  met  coming  down  there  a  naked  Hindu 
Bazva,  or  religious  devotee,  who  was  crossing  from 
Zanskar  to  Lahaul,  accompanied  by  one  attendant,  and 
with  nothing  but  his  loin-cloth,  a  brass  drinking-pot,  and 
a  little  parched  grain.  He  was  a  young  man,  and 
appeared  strong  and  well-nourished.  It  was  passing 
strange  to  find  one  of  these  ascetics  in  the  heart  of  the 
Himaliya,  far  from  the  habitations  of  men  ;  and  when  I 
went  on  without  giving  him  anything,  he  deliberately 
cursed  both  my  pony  and  myself,  and  prophesied  our 
speedy  destruction,  until  I  told  him  that  I  had  slept  at 
the  foot  of  the  Dread  Mother,  which  seemed  to  pacify 
him  a  little.* 

The  first  day  and  a  half  were  the  worst  part  of  this 
journey  over  the  Shinkal  Pass.  Its  features  changed 
greatly  after  we  reached  the  point  where  the  Kado 
Tokpho  divides  into  two  branches,  forded  the  stream  to 

*  Kalika,  the  most  inaccessible  peak  of  the  holy  mountain  Girnar,  in 
Kathiawar.  It  is  consecrated  to  Kali,  or  Durga,  the  goddess  of  destruc- 
tion ;  is  frequented  by  Aghoras — devotees  who  shun  all  society,  and  are 
said  to  eat  canion  and  human  flesh.  The  general  belief  is,  that  of  every 
two  people  who  visit  Kalika,  only  one  comes  back. 


ZANSKAR.  237 


the  right,  and  made  a  very  steep  ascent  of  about  1500 
feet.  Above  that  we  passed  into  an  elevated  picturesque 
valley,  with  a  good  deal  of  grass  and  a  few  birch  bushes, 
which  leads  all  the  way  up  to  the  glacier  that  covers  the 
summit  of  the  pass.  The  usual  camping-ground  in  this 
valley  is  called  Ramjakpuk,  and  that  place  is  well  pro- 
tected from  the  wind  ;  but  there  are  bushes  to  serve  as 
fuel  where  we  pitched  our  tents  a  mile  or  two  below,  at 
a  height  of  about  15,000  feet.  Towards  evening  there 
was  rain  and  a  piercing  cold  wind,  with  the  thermometer 
at  360  Fahr.,  and  many  were  the  surmises  as  to  whether 
we  might  not  be  overtaken  by  a  snowstorm  on  the  higher 
portion  of  the  pass  next  day. 

In  the  morning  the  thermometer  was  exactly  at 
freezing-point,  the  grass  was  white  with  hoar-frost,  and 
there  was  plenty  of  ice  over  the  streams  as  we  advanced 
upwards.  For  some  way  the  path  was  easy  ;  then  there 
was  a  long  steep  ascent,  and  after  that  we  came  on  the 
enormous  glacier  which  is  the  crest  of  this  awful  .pass. 
The  passage  on  to  the  glacier  from  solid  ground  was 
almost  imperceptible,  over  immense  ridges  of  blocks  of 
granite  and  slabs  of  slate.  Some  of  these  first  ridges 
rested  on  the  glacier,  while  others  had  been  thrown  up 
by  it  on  the  rocky  mountain-side  ;  but  soon  the  greater 
ridges  were  left  behind,  and  we  were  fairly  on  the  glacier, 
where  there  were  innumerable  narrow  crevasses,  many 
of  them  concealed  by  white  honeycombed  ice,  numerous 
blocks  of  stone  standing  on  pillars  of  ice,  and  not  a  few 
rills,  and  even  large  brooks,  the  sun  having  been  shining 
powerfully  in  the  morning.  It  was  not  properly  an  ice- 
stream,  but  an  immense  glacial  lake,  on  which  we  stood  ; 
for  it  was  very  nearly  circular  ;  it  was  fed  by  glaciers 
and  snow-slopes  all  round,  and  it  lapped  over  into  the 
villages  beneath  in  several  different  directions.  I  was 
prevented  by  an  incident,  to  be  mentioned  presently, 


238  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

from  calculating  the  height  of  this  pass,  and  the  Trigono- 
metrical Survey  does  not  appear  to  have  done  so  ;  but 
as  Kharjak,  the  first  village  in  Zanskar,  is  13,670  feet, 
and  it  took  me  the  greater  part  of  next  day  to  get 
down  to  Kharjak,  though  I  camped  this  day  at  least 
15CO  feet  below  the  summit  of  the  pass,  on  the  Zanskar 
side,  I  conclude  that  the  Shinkal  cannot  be  less  than 
i8,oco  feet  high,  and  that  it  may  possibly  be  more.  It 
must  be  distinguished  from  another  and  neighbouring 
pass,  also  called  the  Shinkal,  which  is  to  be  found  in 
the  Topographical  Sheet,  No.  46,  and  which  runs  from 
Burdun  Gonpa  apparently  nowhere  except  into  a  region 
of  glaciers.  As  the  word  Shinkal  thus  occurs  twice  on 
the  frontier  of  Zanskar,  it  is  probably  a  local  word  either 
for  a  pass  or  a  glacier.  Of  course  the  difficulty  of 
breathing  at  this  height  was  very  great;  some  of  my 
people  were  bleeding  at  the  nose,  and  it  would  have  been 
hardly  possible  for  us  to  ascend  much  higher.  Hum- 
boldt got  up  on  the  Andes  to  21,000  feet,  and  the 
Schlagentweits  in  the  Himaliya  to  22,000 ;  but  such 
feats  can  only  be  accomplished  in  very  exceptional  states 
of  the  atmosphere.  Higher  ascents  have  been  made  in 
balloons,  but  there  no  exertion  is  required.  In  ordinary 
circumstances,  18,000  feet,  or  nearly  3000  feet  higher 
than  the  summit  of  Mont  Blanc,  is  about  the  limit  of 
human  endurance  when  any  exertion  is  required  ;  and 
on  the  Shinkal  I  had  the  advantage  of  a  strong  saga- 
cious  pon}',  which  carried  me  over  most  of  the  glacier 
easily  enough  ;  but  I  had  a  good  deal  of  work  on  foot, 
and  suffered  much  more  from  the  exertions  I  had  to 
make  than  any  one  else. 

On  reaching  the  middle  of  this  glacial  lake,  it  became 
quite  apparent  where  its  sea  of  ice  came  from.  On 
every  side  were  steep  slopes  of  snow  or  neve',  with  im- 
mense beds  of  snow  overhanoring  them.     It  was  more 


ZANSKAR.  239 

like  a  Place  de  la  Concorde  than  the  basin  of  the 
Aletsch  glacier  in  Switzerland  ;  and  the  surrounding 
masses  of  n&oe  rose  up  in  a  much  more  abrupt  and 
imposing  manner  than  the  surroundings  of  any  scene 
amid  the  High  Alps.  On  the  right,  the  snow-slopes 
were  especially  striking,  being  both  beautiful  and  grand. 
A  dazzling  sheet  of  unbroken  white  snow  rose  up  for 
more  than  a  thousand  feet,  on  a  most  steep  incline,  to 
vast  overhanging  walls  of  what  I  may  call  stratified  nevt, 
from  which  huge  masses  came  down,  every  now  and 
then,  with  a  loud  but  plangent  sound.  So  all  around 
there  were  great  ridges,  fields,  domes,  walls,  and  pre- 
cipices of  snow  and  ice.  No  scene  could  give  a  more 
impressive  idea  of  Eternal  Winter,  or  of  the  mingled 
beauty  and  savagery  of  high  Alpine  life.  Even  Phooley- 
ram,  my  Kunawar  Munshi,  was  struck  by  it.  Up  to 
this  point  I  was  not  aware  that  he  knew  any  English, 
and  had  not  heard  him  speak  in  any  language  for  days, 
he  being  rather  sulky  at  having  to  walk  for  the  most 
part;  but  on  this  occasion  he  suddenly  turned  round 
to  me,  and,  to  my  intense  surprise,  said  in  English,  "  I 
think  this  must  be  the  region  of  perpetual  snow."  That 
was  doubtless  a  reminiscence  of  old  book-knowledge  of 
English  which  had  almost  passed  from  his  mind,  but 
was  recalled  by  the  extraordinary  scene  around,  and  it 
came  in  quite  ingenuously  and  very  appropriately. 

My  attention,  however,  was  soon  recalled  to  a  more 
practical  matter.  Knowing  the  danger  of  crossing  a 
glacier  at  this  height,  and  in  the  threatening  weather 
which  had  been  gathering  for  several  days,  I  had  given 
strict  orders  that  all  the  bigarrics,  or  porters,  should 
keep  together  and  beside  me  ;  but,  on  the  very  summit 
of  the  pass,  in  the  middle  of  the  glacial  lake,  I  found 
that  three-of  them  were  missing,  and  that  they  were  the 
three  who  were  the  most  lightly  laden,  and  who  carried 


240  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

my  most  important  effects — namely,  my  tent-poles,  my 
bedding,  and  the  portmanteau  which  contained  my 
money.  The  tent-poles  might  have  been  dispensed 
with  ;  but  still  the  want  of  them  would  have  caused 
great  inconvenience  in  an  almost  treeless  region,  where 
they  could  not  have  been  replaced.  I  could  only  have 
supplied  the  want  of  the  bedding  by  purchasing  sheep- 
skins, furs,  or  blankets  alive  with  body-lice  ;  and  the 
loss  of  the  rupees  would  have  been  worse  than  either. 
I  have  no  doubt  this  was  a  planned  arrangement,  who- 
ever planned  it;  for  the  bigarrics  who  carried  these 
light  burdens  were  strong  men,  and  the  obvious  motive 
was  that  I  should  be  compelled  to  turn  back  from 
Zanskar  and  take  the  Chandra-Bhaga  route.  On  dis- 
covering this  state  of  matters  I  was  excessively  angry, 
not  so  much  because  of  the  attempt  to  force  my  steps, 
as  on  account  of  the  danger  in  which  some  ignorant 
fools  had  placed  us  all.  Though  the  morning  had  been 
fine,  bad  weather  had  been  gathering  for  several  days  ; 
the  sky  was  now  obscured  ;  clouds  were  rolling  close 
round,  and  to  have  been  overtaken  by  a  snowstorm  on 
that  glacier  would  have  been  almost  certain  death  to 
us  all.  So  long  as  the  sky  was  clear,  and  we  had  the 
snow-walls  to  guide  us,  it  was  easy  enough  to  cross  it ; 
but  where  would  we  have  been  in  a  blinding  snow- 
storm on  a  glacier  at  least  1 8,000  feet  high,  with  no 
central  moraine,  and  lapping  over  on  half  a  dozen 
different  sides  ?  Moreover,  the  snow  would  cover  the 
rotten  honeycombed  ice  which  bridged  over  innumer- 
able crevasses.  All  the  people  about  me,  except,  per- 
haps, the  d/iircic,  were  quite  ignorant  of  the  danger  we 
were  in,  and  that  exasperated  me  more  at  this  tricky 
interference.  As  I  was  determined  not  to  turn  on  my 
steps,  I  saw  that  not  a  moment  was  to  be  lost  in  taking 
decided    measures ;    so    I    made    my   servants    and    the 


ZANSKAR.  241 


bigarrics  continue  across  the  glacier,  with  instructions 
to  camp  at  the  first  available  spot  on  the  Zanskar  side, 
and  threatened  them  if  they  delayed,  while  I  myself 
rode  back,  accompanied  by  one  man,  in  search  of  the 
missing  coolies  and  their  loads.  There  was  an  obvious 
danger  in  this,  because  it  involved  the  risk  of  being  cut 
off  from  my  people  and  baggage  ;  but  it  was  really  the 
only  thing  to  be  done  in  the  circumstances  consonant 
with  a  determination  to  proceed.  So  I  waited  until 
my  party  disappeared  on  the  brow  of  the  glacier,  and 
then  rode  back  in  a  savage  and  reckless  humour  over 
ice  which  I  had  previously  crossed  in  a  very  cautious 
manner.  I  could  easily  retrace  our  track  until  we  got 
to  the  great  stony  ridges,  and  then  the  man  I  had  taken 
with  me  was  useful.  On  getting  off  there,  and  descend- 
ing the  valley  a  short  way,  I  found  my  three  light- laden 
gentlemen  quietly  reposing,  and  immediately  forced 
them  to  resume  their  burdens,  and  go  on  before  me. 
Even  then  they  showed  some  unwillingness  to  proceed  ; 
and  I  had  to  act  the  part  of  the  Wild  Horseman  of  the 
Glacier,  driving  them  before  me,  and  progging  whoever 
happened  to  be  hindmost  with  the  iron  spike  of  my 
heavy  alpenstock,  which  considerably  accelerated  their 
movements.  There  was  the  most  urgent  reason  for 
this,  because,  had  we  been  half  an  hour  later  in  getting 
over  the  summit  of  the  pass,  the  probability  is  that  we 
should  have  been  lost.  It  began  to  snow  before  we  got 
off  the  glacier  ;  and  when  we  descended  a  few  hundred 
feet,  it  was  snowing  so  heavily  on  the  ice-lake  we  had 
just  left,  that  we  could  not  there  have  seen  two  yards 
before  our  faces,  and  it  would  have  been  quite  impos- 
sible to  know  in  which  direction  to  turn,  the  tracks  of 
our  party  being  obliterated,  and  the  crevasses,  which 
ran  in  every  direction,  affording  no  guidance.  Even  on 
the  narrow  glaciers  of  the  Alps  a  number  of  people  have 

Q 


242  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO IV. 

been  lost  by  being  caught  in  snowstorms ;  so  it  can  be 
imagined  what  chance  there  would  have  been  for  us 
on  a  great  lake  of  ice  above  18,000  feet  high.  Without 
the  tracks  and  a  sight  of  the  surrounding  snow-walls  to 
guide  us,  we  could  only  have  wandered  about  hopelessly 
in  the  blinding  storm  ;  and  if  we  did  not  fall  into  a 
crevasse,  through  rotten  ice  concealed  by  the  new-fallen 
snow,  we  might  have  wandered  on  to  one  of  the  outlets 
where  the  ice  flowed  over  in  steep  hanging  glaciers, 
which  it  would  have  been  impossible  to  descend.  For- 
tunately, however,  we  managed  to  keep  the  proper  track 
in  spite  of  the  snow  which  was  beginning  to  blind  us. 
On  reaching  our  camp,  I  found  it  pitched  on  a  morass 
about  1500  or  2000  feet  below  the  summit  of  the  pass. 
The  thermometer  was  two  degrees  below  freezing-point, 
and  a  little  snow  continued  to  fall  about  us.  I  felt  ex- 
tremely exhausted  after  the  exertion  and  excitement  of 
the  day  ;  but  some  warm  soup  and  the  glow  of  a  fire  of 
birch  branches  revived  me,  and  I  soon  fell  into  a  deep 
refreshing  sleep. 

A  little  after  midnight  Iwas  awakened  by  the  intense 
cold,  and  went  out  of  my  tent,  and  a  little  way  up  the 
pass,  to  look  upon  the  scene  around.  Everything  was 
frozen  up  and  silent.  The  pools  of  water  about  us  had 
ice  an  inch  thick  ;  my  servants  were  in  their  closed  raiiti, 
and  the  bigarries  were  sleeping,  having,  for  protection 
from  the  cold,  twisted  themselves  into  a  circle  round  the 
embers  of  their  dying  fire.  There  was  the  awful  silence 
of  the  high  mountains  when  the  snow  and  ice  cease  to 
creep  under  the  influence  of  the  sunbeams.  The  storm 
had  ceased — 

"  The  mute  still  air 
Was  Music  slumbering  on  her  instrument ;" 

the  snow-clouds  also  had  entirely  passed  away.  The 
moon,  which  was  little  past  its  full,  cast  a  brilliant  radi- 


ZANSKAR.  243 


ance  on  the  savage  scene  around,  so  that  every  precipice, 
snow-wall,  and  icy  peak  was  visible  in  marvellous  dis- 
tinctness ;  and  in  its  keen  light  the  great  glaciers  shone 
gloriously :  but,  brilliant  as  the  moon  was,  its  light  was 
insufficient  to  obscure  the  stars,  which,  at  this  altitude, 
literally  flamed  above,  displaying — 

"All  the  dread  magnificence  of  heaven." 

At  night,  amid  these  vast  mountains,  surrounded  by 
icy  peaks,  shining  starlike  and  innumerable  as  the  hosts 
of  heaven,  and  looking  up  to  the  great  orbs  flaming  in 
the  unfathomable  abysses  of  space,  one  realises  the  im- 
mensity of  physical  existence  in  an  overpowering  and 
almost  painful  manner.  What  am  I  ?  what  are  all  these 
Tibetans  and  Paharries  compared  with  the  long  line  of 
gigantic  mountains  ?  and  what  the  mountains  and  the 
whole  solar  system  as  compared  with  any  group  of  the 
great  fixed  stars  ?  But  this  whole  stellar  universe  which 
we  see  around  us  distinctly,  extending  beyond  the  limits 
of  human  conception — sparkling  with  stars  on  which  the 
earth  would  be  no  more  than  a  grain  of  sand  is  upon 
the  earth,  and  including  the  undistinguished  orbs  which 
afford  the  light  of  the  Milky  Way — would  be  no  more 
to  our  vision,  if  beheld  from  one  of  those  dim  nebula 
rings,  composed  of  more  distant  stars,  than  the  wreath  of 
smoke  blown  from  a  cannon's  mouth.  Though  the  facts 
have  long  been  known,  modern  thought  appears  to  be 
only  now  realising  the  power  and  boundless  extent  of 
the  physical  universe  ;  for  the  phenomenon  of  conversion, 
or  the  effective  realisation  of  admitted  truth,  is  by  no 
means  confined  to  purely  religious  circles,  but  is  a  pro- 
cess which  extends  over  the  whole  range  of  human  know- 
ledge. It  is  no  wonder  that  such  a  realisation  should 
engross  the  thoughts  of  many  filings,  and  appear  almost 
as  a  new  revelation.     But,  accustomed  as  I  was  to  the 


244  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

questions  which  thus  arise,  a  strange  feeling  came  over 
me  amid  those  snowy  peaks  and  starlit  spaces.  How 
wonderful  the  order  and  perfection  of  the  inorganic  uni- 
verse as  compared  with  the  misery  and  confusion  of  the 
organic  !  Oxygen  does  not  lie  to  hydrogen  ;  the  white 
clouds  pass  gently  into  exquisitely-shaped  flowers  of 
snow;  the  blue  ocean  laughs  unwounded  round  our  star, 
and  is  gently  drawn  up  to  form  the  gorgeous  veil  of 
blue  air  and  many-tinted  cloud  which  makes  the  rugged 
earth  beautiful.  With  perfectly  graduated  power,  the 
sun  holds  the  planets  in  their  course,  and,  to  the  utmost 
range  of  mortal  ken,  the  universe  is  filled  with  glorious 
orbs.  But  when  we  turn  to  the  organic  life  around  us, 
how  strange  the  contrast,  and  especially  as  regards  its 
higher  manifestations !  A  few  individuals  in  every  age, 
but  especially  at  present,  when  they  benefit  by  the  ex- 
ceptional standing-ground  which  such  discoveries  as  that 
of  the  use  of  steam  has  given  to  the  people  of  this  cen- 
tury, may,  arguing  from  their  own  experience,  imagine 
that  this  is  a  satisfactory  and  happy  world  ;  but,  un- 
fortunately, it  is  only  a  select  few  who  console  them- 
selves with  that  illusion.  Not  in  selfishness  nor  in  anger, 
but  in  sad  necessity,  in  every  age  and  clime,  the  voice  of 
humanity  has  risen  in  wondering  sorrow  and  question- 
ing to  the  silent  heaven,  and  a  different  tone  is  adopted 
chiefly  by  those  who  are  tossed  up  for  a  moment  on  the 
wave  into  the  sunlight.  I  need  only  refer  to  what  the 
history  of  the  animal  creation  (and  more  especially  the 
human  part  of  it)  has  been,  and  to  the  part  which  even 
its  better  tendencies  play  in  augmenting  the  sum  of 
wretchedness.  The  Hurdwar  tigress,  which  held  a  boy 
down  in  her  den,  though  his  shrieks  rang  from  the 
rocks  around,  while  her  cubs  played  with  him,  was  gra- 
tifying a  holy  maternal  instinct  ;  and  the  vivisectors  of 
Europe  are  only  slaking  the  sacred  thirst  for  knowledge. 


ZANSKAR.  245 


Dr  Livingstone  wrote  in  one  of  his  last  journals,  after 
witnessing  a  massacre  of  inoffending  villagers — men, 
women,  and  children — on  the  shore  of  Lake  Tanganyika  : 
"  No  one  will  ever  know  the  exact  loss  on  this  bright 
sultry,  summer  morning  ;  it  gave  me  the  impression  of 
being  in  hell ;"  but  still 

"  The  heavens  keep  up  their  terrible  composure." 

The  scene  to  which  he  referred  was  far  from  being  an 
abnormal  one  on  the  African  continent,  or  different  from 
its  ordinary  experience  for  countless  generations  ;  and 
when  he  referred  to  the  locality  in  which  such  scenes 
are  supposed  to  be  natural,  perhaps  the  great  African 
traveller  hit  the  mark  nearer  than  he  was  himself  aware 
of,  though  that  would  not  prove  that  there  may  not  be 
a  worse  place  below.  I  merely  give  one  or  two  illustra- 
tions, and  do  not  attempt  a  proof  which  would  require 
one  to  go  over  the  history  of  the  human  race  and  of  the 
brute  creation,  which  has  been  conjoined  with  it  by  the 
common. bond  of  misery.  I  need  scarcely  say,  also,  that 
the  view  of  organic  life  which  I  have  thus  mildly  indi- 
cated is  the  same  as  that  of  all  the  great  thinkers  of  the 
earth,  and  of  all  our  great  systems  of  religion.  The  an- 
cient Plindu  sages  soon  perceived  and  expressly  taught 
that  our  life  was  utterly  undesirable.  It  was  his  pro- 
found sense  of  the  misery  and  worthlessness  of  life 
which  drove  Gautama  Budha  from  his  throne  into  the 
jungle,  which  underlies  all  the  meaning  of  the  religion 
which  he  founded,  and  which  finds  forcible  expression  in 
the  Biidhist  hymn,  "  All  is  transitory,  all  is  misery,  all  is 
void,  all  is  without  substance."  And  the  cardinal  doc- 
trine of  Christianity  has  the  same  meaning,  though  it  is 
often  verbally  accepted  without  being  realised.  Accept- 
ing it,  I  cannot  conceal  from  myself  its  true  signification. 
That  awful  meaning  plainly  is,  that  the  only  way  in 


246  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

which  the  Creator  of  the  human  race  could  redeem  it, 
or  perhaps  only  a  portion  of  it,  from  utter  perdition,  was 
by  identifying  Himself  with  it,  and  bearing  an  infinite 
burden  of  sin  and  agony.  Shirk  the  thought  as  we  may, 
it  cannot  be  denied  that  this  is  the  real  meaning  of  the 
Christian  religion,  and  it  finds  innumerable  corrobora- 
tions from  every  side  of  our  knowledge.  The  burden  is 
shifted,  but  has  to  be  borne.  Human  existence  is  re- 
deemed and  rendered  tolerable,  not  from  any  efforts 
made  out  of  its  own  great  misery  and  despair,  but  from 
its  Creator  taking  upon  Himself  the  punishment  and  the 
agony  which  pursues  His  creation.  Far  be  it  from  me 
to  complain  of  the  Providence  which  enabled  me  to  pass 
through  those  tremendous  scenes  in  safety,  or  to  arraign 
the  wisdom  of  the  arrangements  of  the  universe.  I  only 
suggest  that  existence  in  itself  implies  effort,  pain,  and 
sorrow  ;  and  that  the  more  perfect  it  is,  the  more  does 
it  suffer.  This  may  be  a  Budhistic  idea  ;  but,  as  pointed 
out  above,  it  is  certainly  a  Christian  doctrine,  though 
the  true  meaning  of  it  seems  scarcely  to  have  been 
understood.  Of  His  own  will,  Deity  is  involved  in  the 
suffering  of  His  creation,  so  that  we  cannot  say  where 
the  agony  ends.  Our  notions  on  this  subject  are  con- 
fused by  starting  from  the  supposition  that  there  is  an 
effortless  existence  of  pure  unshadowed  enjoyment  for 
which  no  price  has  been  paid  ;  and  the  more  we  realise 
the  actual  state  of  tlfe  case,  though  doing  so  may  have 
a  saddening  effect,  yet  it  will  not  necessarily  lead  "us  to 
doubt  that  existence  vindicates  itself,  much  less  to 
arraign  Eternal  Providence,  or  the  ways  of  God  towards 
man. 

Thoughts  of  this  character,  however  true  they  might  be 
in  themselves,  were  not  fitted  to  give  a  cheerful  aspect 
to  that  midnight  scene  on  the  Shinkal  Pass.  The 
"  Zartusht  Namah  "  says  that  when  Zoroaster  lay  one 


ZANSKAR. 


247 


cold  night  under  the  stars,  "  understanding  was  the  com- 
panion of  his  soul."  I  hope  he  found  understanding  to 
be  a  more  agreeable  companion  than  I  did  ;  for  there 
are  moments  of  depression  when  we  seem  to  feel  still  in 
need  of  some  explanation  why  organic  life  should  exist 
at  all. 

"  A  life 
With  large  results  so  little  rife, 
Though  bearable,  seems  hardly  worth 
This  pomp  of  worlds,  this  pain  of  birth." 

Our  civilisations  reach  a  certain  point,  and  then  die 
corruptly,  leaving  half  savage  races,  inspired  by  coarse 
illusions,  to  reoccupy  the  ground  and  react  the  same 
terrible  drama.  Wordsworth  put  the  usual  answer 
admirably  when  he  said — 

"  O  Life  !  without  thy  checkered  scene 
Of  right  and  wrong,  of  weal  and  woe, 
Success  and  failure,  could  a  ground 
For  magnanimity  be  found, 
For  faith,  'mid  ruined  hopes  serene? 
Or  whence  could  virtue  flow  ?" 

But  the  difficulty  of  this  argument,  so  far  as  our  know- 
ledge goes,  appears  to  be  the  enormous  waste  and  use- 
less, endless  cruelty  of  Nature,  as  also  in  the  purely  fan- 
ciful ground  of  the  suppositions  which  have  been  brought 
to  explain  that  cruelty,  and  which,  even  if  admitted, 
do  not  really  solve  the  mystery.  Nor  is  there  much 
consolation  to  be  found  in  the  views  of  the  monadic 
school,  which  have  been  so  forcibly  expressed  by  Goethe 
in  his  poem  Das  GottlicJi ;  which  I  may  here  translate, 
as  it  was  in  my  mind  on  the  Shinkal  Pass: — 


Noble  be  Man, 

Helpful  and  good  ; 

For  this  alone  separateth  him 

From  every  being 

We  do  know  of. 


Hail  to  the  unfathomed 
Highest  Being 
Whom  we  follow  ! 
May  1  Ie,  too,  teach  us 
All  believing. 


248 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


Ever  Nature 

Is  unfeeling : 

She  lighteth  the  sun 

Over  evil  and  good  ; 

And  for  the  destroyer 

Shine,  as  o'er  the  best, 

The  moon  and  the  stars. 

Storms  and  rivers, 
Thunder  and  hail 
Pursue  their  path, 
Ever  hasting, 
Downward  breaking 
On  the  sons  of  men. 

Also  Fortune, 
Wand'ring  along, 
Seizes  the  locks 
Of  the  innocent  child, 
And  empties  her  horn 
Over  the  guilty. 

For  all  of  us  must, 
After  eternal 
Laws  of  iron, 
Fulfil  our  being. 


Man  alone  has  power 
To  grasp  the  Impossible. 
He  separatelh, 
Chooseth  and  judgeth 
And  righteth  the  evils 
The  hour  has  brought  forth. 

He  alone  dare 
Reward  the  righteous, 
The  evil  punish, 
Purify,  and  save ; 
And  usefully  govern 
Doubting  and  error. 

And  ever  we  honour 
Him  whom  we  image, 
In  honouring  men 
Immortal  in  deeds 
Over  great  and  small.* 

Let  the  noble  man 
Be  helpful  and  good  ; 
Unwearied,  let  him  shaps 
The  useful  and  right, 
Be  to  us  an  image 
Of  the  Eternal. 


This  is  well  in  its  way ;  but  when  we  consider  what 
humanity  has  been  able  to  accomplish  in  imaging  the 
divine,  it  would  seem  as  if  a  voice  had  said  to  us,  as 
to  the  Prometheus  of  ^Eschylus,  "  Evermore  shall  the 
burden  of  the  agony  of  the  present  evil  wear  thee  down  ; 
for  he  that  shall  deliver  thee  exists  not  in  nature." 
There  is  some  refuge,  however,  for  the  spirit  in  the  order 
and  beauty  of  this  unfeeling  inorganic  nature.  The 
Yliastron,  or  materia  prima,  has  strange  attractions  of 
its  own.  So  orthodox  a  thinker  as  John  Foster  could 
write — "  There  is  through  all  nature  some  mysterious 
element  like  soul  which  comes  with  a  deep  significance 
to  mingle  itself  with  our  own  conscious  being,  .  .  .  con- 


*  This  stanza  differs  somewhat  from  the  original. 


ZANSKAR.  2.19 


veying  into  the  mind  trains  and  masses  of  ideas  of  an 
order  not  to  be  gained  in  the  schools."  Speaking  of 
a  departed  friend  and  brilliant  poet,  Goethe  said — "  I 
should  not  be  surprised  if,  thousands  of  years  hence,  I 
were  to  meet  Wieland  as  the  monad  of  a  world — as  a 
star  of  the  first  magnitude.  .  .  .  We  can  admit  of  no 
other  destination  for  monads  than  as  blessed  co-operating 
powers  sharing  eternally  in  the  immortal  joys  of  gods." 
In  like  manner,  when  the  most  purely  poetical  genius  of 
England  foresaw  his  own  passage  from  this  troubled  life, 
it  was  as  a  star  that  the  soul  of  Adonais  beaconed  from 
the  abodes  of  the  Eternal ;  and  in  describing  the  gain  of 
his  brother-poet,  he  could  only  break  forth — 

"  It  was  for  thee  yon  kingless  sphere  has  long 
Swung  blind,  in  unascended  majesty, 
Silent,  alone  amid  a  heaven  of  song." 

These  may  be  something  more  than  poets'  dreams, 
but  "the  immortal  mind  craves  objects  that  endure," 
and  such  are  scarcely  to  be  found  in  lower  forms  of  life, 
or  in  the  inorganic  world,  for  even — 

"  The  lily  fair  a  transient  beauty  wears, 
And  the  white  snow  soon  weeps  away  in  tears." 

Logical  thought  becomes  impossible  when  we  rise  into 
these  1 8,000- feet  regions  of  speculation  ;  and  it  may  be 
safer  to  trust  our  instincts,  such  as  they  are.  Apparently 
heedless  of  us,  the  worlds  roll  through  space — 

**  While  we,  the  brave,  the  mighty,  and  the  wise, 
We  men  who  in  our  morn  of  youth  defied 

The  elements,  must  vanish  ;—  be  it  so  ! 
Enough  if  something  from  our  hands  have  power 
To  live  and  act  and  serve  the  future  hour ; 

And  if,  as  toward  the  siient  tomb  we  go, 
Through  love,  through  hope,  and  faith's  transcendent  dower, 

We  fed  that  we  are  greater  than  we  know" 


250  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Next  morning  was  excessively  cold,  and  we  were  glad 
to  hurry  down  the  pass.  The  way  ran  down  a  not  very 
steep  slope  to  a  glacier-stream  (which  it  might  be  diffi- 
cult to  ford  during  the  heat  of  the  day),  then  on  a  slight 
ascent  to  the  end  of  an  enormous  spur  of  the  mountains, 
where  there  was  a  very  long  and  extremely  steep  descent 
to  La-kung — "  the  pass-house,"  a  large,  low,  stone  room, 
with  no  window  but  the  door,  and  with  open  spaces 
between  the  stones, — which  has  been  erected  for  the 
protection  of  shepherds  and  travellers.  We  were  now 
within  the  watershed  of  the  Indus,  in  the  valley  of  the 
Kharjak  Chu,  one  of  the  mountain  streams  which  form 
the  Tsarap  Lingti  river.  There  were  very  formidable- 
looking  mountains  to  the  right,  through  which  the  diiirzie, 
who  was  a  great  geographical  authority,  assured  me  there 
was  no  available  pass  to  Ladak.  In  and  descending 
from  the  mountains  to  the  left — that  is  to  say,  on  the 
left  bank  of  the  river  down  to  Padam,  and  on  the  right 
bank  of  the  river  which  runs  from  the  Pense-la  Pass 
down  to  Padam  on  the  other  side — there  is  probably 
the  most  tremendous  series  of  glaciers  to  be  found  in  the 
world,  out  of  arctic  and  antarctic  regions.  There  are 
literally  hundreds  of  them  ;  they  extend  on  through 
Sum,  and  even  within  the  boundary  of  Kashmir  proper, 
and  at  some  parts  they  come  down  into  the  large  rivers, 
threatening  to  block  them  up. 

As  the  path  runs  down  its  right  bank,  we  had  to  ford 
the  Kharjak  Chu  ;  but  though  broad  and  rapid,  it  is 
shallow  at  this  place,  and  there  was  little  difficulty  in 
doing  so  ;  but  In  warmer  weather  it  must  be  impossible 
to  cross  it  during  the  day.  The  path  now  followed  the 
windings  of  the  stream,  sometimes  over  grassy  meads, 
and  anon  over  aggravating  stone  avalanches.  We  were 
now  fairly  in  the  almost  fabulous  Zanskar,  but  no  signs 
of  human  habitations  were  visible.     At  first  we  passed 


ZANSKAR.  251 

beneath  tremendous  cliffs  of  cream-coloured  granite, 
which,  as  we  got  farther  down,  appeared  as  one  side  of 
an  enormous  detached  pyramidal  mass,  high  and  steep 
as  the  Matterhorn,  and  so  smooth  that  scarcely  any 
snow  lodged  upon  it,  though  it  could  have  been  little 
short  of  20,000  feet  high.  From  some  points  this 
extraordinary  mountain  looked  almost  like  a  column; 
and  I  am  sure  if  any  Lama,  Bawa,  or  lover  of  inorganic 
nature  could  get  up  to  the  top  of  it,  he  would  enjoy  the 
most  perfect  seclusion.  Of  all  the  mountains  I  have 
ever  beheld,  those  of  Zanskar  were  the  most  picturesque, 
weird,  astounding,  and  perplexing.  For  several  marches, 
all  the  way  down  the  valley  of  this  river,  and  through 
almost  all  the  valley  of  the  Tsarap  Lingti,  the  precipice 
walls  were  not  only  of  enormous  height,  but  presented 
the  most  extraordinary  forms,  colours,  and  combinations 
of  rock.  Even  the  upper  Spiti  valley  has  nothing  so 
wonderful.  There  were  castles,  spires,  plateaus,  domes, 
aiguilles  of  solid  rock,  and  spires  composed  of  the 
shattered  fragments  of  some  fallen  mountains.  At  the 
entrance  of  many  of  the  ravines  there  were  enormous 
cliffs,  thousands  of  feet  high,  which  looked  exactly  as  if 
they  were  bastions  which  had  been  shaped  by  the  hands 
of  giants.  Every  mile  or  so  we  had  to  scramble  across 
the  remains  of  some  stone  avalanche  which  deflected 
the  stream  from  its  course,  and  under  cliffs  from  which 
great  rocks  projected,  so  that  it  looked  as  if  a  slight 
touch  would  send  them  thundering  down.  Then  the 
colour  of  these  precipice  walls  was  of  the  richest  and 
most  varied  kind.  The  predominant  tints  were  green, 
purple,  orange,  brown,  black,  and  whitish-yellow,  but  I 
cannot  say  how  many  more  there  might  have  been; 
and  green,  purple,  and  deep  brown  were  most  frequent. 
It  can  easily  be  imagined  that,  with  such  colours,  the 
dazzling  sunlight   and   the   shadows  of  the   mountains 


252  THE  ABODE  OE  SNOW. 

falling  over  the  valley  worked  the  most  wonderful 
effects.  Sometimes  the  sunlight  came  down  through  a 
dark-coloured  ravine  like  a  river  of  gold.  In  certain 
lights  the  precipices  appeared  almost  as  if  they  were  of 
chalcedony  and  jasper.  The  dark-brown  manganese- 
like cliffs  looked  exceedingly  beautiful ;  but  no  sooner 
was  one  extraordinary  vista  left  behind  than  a  different 
but  not  less  striking  one  broke  upon  the  view.  The 
geology  of  these  valleys  was  rather  puzzling ;  for  a 
remarkable  feature  here,  as  elsewhere  to  a  less  degree 
among  the  Himaliya,  is  the  way  in  which  various  rocks 
pass  into  each  other,  as  the  clay  slate  into  mica-slate, 
the  mica-slate  into  granite,  the  quartzose  conglomerate 
into  greywacke,  and  the  micaceous  schist  into  gneiss. 
I  was  unable  to  pay  any  special  attention  to  the  geology 
of  this  interesting  region,  and  indeed  I  found  the  conti- 
nuous journey  I  had  undertaken  rather  too  much  for  my 
strength.  Could  I  have  rested  more  frequently  I  would 
have  enjoyed  it  more,  and  have  observed  more  closely. 
As  it  was,  I  had  continually  to  press  onwards,  and  being 
alone  caused  a  great  strain  on  my  energies,  because 
everything  in  that  case  depends  on  the  one  traveller 
himself.  H<e  has  to  see  that  proper  arrangements 
are  made  ;  that  his  servants  do  not  practise  extortion  ; 
that  his  camp  is  roused  at  an  early  hour  in  the  morning; 
and  he  has  almost  to  sleep  with  one  eye  open.  Any- 
thing like  an  examination  of  these  Zanskar  cliffs  would 
have  required  several  days  specially  devoted  to  them, 
which  I  could  by  no  means  spare.  Some  of  them  were 
composed  of  rocks  which  I  had  never  met  with  before; 
and  others,  judging  from  the  fragments  in  the  valley 
below,  were  of  quartzose  conglomerate,  passing  into 
greywacke  of  grey  and  greenish  colour,  of  clay-slate, 
very  fine  grained  mica-slate,  gneiss,  greenstone,  smooth 
soapy  talc,  and  porphyry.      There  seemed  to  be  much 


ZANSKAR.  253 


zeolite,  and  probably  other  minerals  abounded.  This 
part  of  Zanskar  does  not  seem  to  have  been  examined 
by  the  Trigonometrical  Survey,  and  is  nearly  a  blank  in 
all  our  maps. 

After  passing  down  the  valley  for  several  hours,  we 
came  at  last  upon  Kharjak  or  Khargia,  the  first  village 
of  Zanskar,  comprising  little  more  than  about  a  dozen 
houses,  and  with  only  two  or  three  poor  fields.  There 
were  a  great  number,  however,  of  yaks  and  ponies,  and 
no  signs  of  poverty  about  the  place.  The  people  are 
Tibetan-speaking  Lama  Biidhists,  and  differ  from  those 
of  the  other  Tibetan  provinces  of  the  Himaliya  only  in 
being  more  pastoral,  more  primitive,  more  devout,  more 
hospitable,  and  less  democratic.  Kharjak  is  a  depen- 
dency of  the  larger  village  of  Thesur,  about  a  day's 
journey  down  the  valley.  The  principal  Talukdar  of 
both  was  in  it  when  I  arrived,  and  his  reception  of  us, 
as  well  as  that  given  by  all  the  people,  formed  a  very 
pleasing  contrast  to  the  inhospitality  of  the  Lahaulies. 
The  Talukdar  gave  me  a  rupee  as  a  huziir  or  act  of 
obeisance,  and  insisted  on  furnishing  my  servants  with 
horses  for  the  next  two  days'  journey,  purely  out  of  the 
hospitality  of  a  mountaineer.  He  himself  accompanied 
us  these  two  days,  with  three  times  the  number  of  men 
that  I  required  or  paid  for,  merely  to  show  me  respect, 
and  he  was  very  kind  and  attentive  in  every  way.  Any 
sportsmen  who  have  gone  into  Zanskar  have  done  so 
from  Kashmir,  and  only  as  far  as  Padam,  so  that  in  this 
part  of  the  country  Sahibs  are  almost  unknown.  I  am 
not  aware  that  any  one  has  passed  through  it  since  Mr 
Heyde  did  so,  and  in  these  circumstances,  hospitality, 
though  pleasant,  is  not  to  be  wondered  at.  Kharjak.  as 
I  have  mentioned,  is  13,670  feet  high,  and  it  is  inhabited 
all  the  year  round.     The  sky  was  overclouded  in  the 


254  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO IV. 

afternoon  ;  some  rain  fell,  and  a  violent  wind  arose, 
which  continued  through  great  part  of  the  night. 

Around  this  highly- elevated  village  there  is  an 
unusual  number  of  large  Choten,  nearly  solid  edifices, 
generally  composed  of  large  square  platforms,  placed 
one  above  another,  and  surrounded  by  the  larger  half 
of  an  inverted  cone,  which  supports  a  tapering  pillar 
bearing  a  Dharma  emblem.  These  Choten  were  ori- 
ginally receptacles  for  offerings,  and  for  the  relics  of 
departed  saints,  and  they  thus  came  to  be  considered  a 
holy  symbol,  and  to  be  made  large  without  containing 
either  offerings  or  relics.  They  are  sometimes  of  nearly 
a  pyramidal  shape.  According  to  Koeppen,  the  proper 
names  for  them  are  m  Tschod,  r  Ten,  or  g  Dung,  r  Ten, 
and  General  Cunningham  says  that  the  latter  word 
denotes  the  proper  boneholders  or  depositaries  of  holy 
relics  ;  but  Choten,  or  something  very  like  it,  has 
come  to  be  generally  applied  to  all  edifices  of  this  kind. 
There  are  more  than  a  dozen  of  them  about  Kharjak, 
some  nearly  twenty  feet  high,  and  they  do  not  seem  to 
be  associated  with  any  particular  saint.  Some  of  them 
had  what  by  courtesy  might  be  taken  for  a  pair  of  eyes 
figured  on  the  basement;  and  this,  Cunningham  informs 
us,  means  that  they  are  dedicated  to  the  supreme 
Budha,  "the  eye  of  the  universe."  One  also  frequently 
finds  among  the  Tibetans  small  Choten,  three  or  four 
inches  high,  and  I  was  shown  one  of  these  which  was 
said  to  contain  the  ashes  of  a  man's  wife. 

Zanskar  is  rich,  too,  in  the  Mani  which  are  to  be  found 
sometimes  in  the  most  desolate  situations.  These  are 
long  tumuli  or  broad  dykes  of  stones,  many  of  which 
stones  are  inscribed  or  sculptured.  They  are  met  with 
even  high  up  among  the  mountains,  and  vary  in  length 
from  thirty  feet  to  so  many  as  a  thousand  and  even  more. 
Their  usual  height  is  about  five  feet,  and  the  breadth 


ZANSKAR.  255 


about  ten.  I  suppose  I  must  have  passed  hundreds  of 
these  Mani  on  my  journey  ;  and  the  Tibetans  invariably 
pass  so  as  to  keep  them  on  the  right-hand  side,  but  I 
have  been  unable  to  discover  the  meaning  of  this  prac- 
tice. The  stones  are  beautifully  inscribed,  for  the  most 
part,  with  the  universal  Lama  prayer,  "  Om  mani  pad 
me  haun  ; "  but  Herr  Jaeschke  informs  me  that  sometimes 
whole  pages  of  the  Tibetan  Scriptures  are  to  be  found 
upon  them,  and  they  have,  more  rarely,  well-executed 
bas-reliefs  of  Budha,  of  various  saints,  and  of  sacred 
Budhistic  symbols.  These  stones  are  usually  prepared 
and  deposited  for  some  special  reason,  such  as  for  safety 
on  a  journey,  for  a  good  harvest,  for  the  birth  of  a  son  ; 
and  the  prodigious  number  of  them  in  so  thinly  peopled 
a  country  indicates  an  extraordinary  waste  of  human 
energy. 

In  a  certain  formal  sense  the  Tibetans  are  undoubtedly 
a  praying  people,  and  the  most  pre-eminently  praying 
people  on  the  face  of  the  earth.  They  have  praying 
stones,  praying  pyramids,  praying  flags  flying  over  every 
house,  praying  wheels,  praying  mills,  and  the  universal 
prayer,  "  Om  mani  pad  me  haun,"  is  never  out  of  their 
mouths.  In  reference  to  that  formula,  Koeppen,  in  his 
"  Lamaische  Hierarchie  und  Kirche,"  p.  59,  makes  the 
following  striking  remarks,  the  truth  of  which  every 
Tibetan  traveller  will  allow  : — "  These  primitive  six  syl- 
lables which  the  Lamas  repeat  are,  of  all  the  prayers 
of  earth,  the  prayer  which  is  most  frequently  repeated, 
written,  printed,  and  conveniently  offered  up  by  me- 
chanical means.  They  constitute  the  only  prayer  which 
the  common  Mongols  and  Tibetans  know  ;  they  are  the 
first  words  which  the  stammering  child  learns,  and  are 
the  last  sighs  of  the  dying.  The  traveller  murmurs 
them  upon  his  journey ;  the  herdsman  by  his  flock  ;  the 
wife  in  her  daily  work  ;  the  monk  in  all  stages  of  con- 


256  THE  ABODE  OF  SNO IV. 

templation,  that  is  to  say,  of  nihilism  ;  and  they  are  the 
cries  of  conflict  and  triumph.  One  meets  with  them  every- 
where wherever  the  Lama  Church  has  established  itself 
— on  flags,  rocks,  trees,  walls,  stone  monuments,  uten- 
sils, strips  of  paper,  human  skulls,  skeletons,  and  so 
forth.  They  are,  according  to  the  meaning  of  the  be- 
liever, the  essence  of  all  religion,  of  all  wisdom  and 
revelation  ;  they  are  the  way  of  salvation,  and  the 
entrance  to  holiness.  4  These  six  syllables  unite  the 
joys  of  all  Budhas  in  one  point,  and  are  the  root  of  all 
doctrine.  They  are  the  heart  of  hearts  out  of  which 
everything  profitable  and  blessed  flows  ;  they  are  the 
root  of  all  knowledge,  the  guide  to  rebirth  in  a  higher 
state  of  being,  the  door  which  the  curse  of  birth  has 
closed  up,  the  ship  which  carries  us  out  of  the  mutations 
of  birth,,  the  light  which  illumines  the  black  darkness, 
the  valiant  conqueror  of  the  Five  Evils,  the  flaming 
ocean  in  which  sins  and  sorrows  are  destroyed,  the 
hammer  which  shatters  all  pain,' — and  so  forth." 

That  is  pretty  well  for  a  glorification  of  "  Om  mani 
pad  me  haun,"  and  one  becomes  impatient  to  know 
what  these  mystic  syllables  mean,  and  how  they  come 
to  possess  such  tremendous  power.  It  is  rather  dis- 
appointing to  find  that  the  closest  English  version  of  them 
which  can  be  given  is — "  O  God  !  the  jewel  in  the  lotus! 
Amen."  I  have  gone  carefully  into  this  subject,  and 
little  more  can  be  got  out  of  it.  Substantially  the  prayer, 
or  rather  exclamation,  is  not  of  Tibetan,  but  of  Sanscrit 
origin.  Koeppen  translates  it  simply  as — "  O  !  das  Klei- 
nod  im  Lotus  !  Amen."  But  that  is  quite  insufficient, 
because  the  great  force  of  the  formula  lies  in  "  Om,"  the 
sacred  syllable  of  the  Hindus,  which  ought  never  to  be 
pronounced,  and  which  denotes  the  absolute,  the  supreme 
Divinity.     In  order  to  show  the  literal   meaning,    the 


ZANSKAR.  257 


words  may  be  translated  into  their  English  equivalents, 
thus — 

Om  Mani      Pad  me  Haun. 

O  God !    the  jewel  lotus  in  Amen  ! 

I  need  not  go  into  the  mystic  explanations  of  this  for- 
mula, as,  for  instance,  that  each  of  the  five  syllables 
which  follow  the  sacred  "om"  is  a  preservative  against 
a  particular  great  class  of  evils.  Suffice  to  note  that  the 
repeating  of  this  prayer — whether  vocally  or  by  various 
mechanical  means — has  become  a  sacred  and  protecting 
symbol,  such  as  making  the  sign  of  the  cross  is  among 
Roman  Catholic  Christians.  However  it  may  be  with 
the  more  intelligent  of  the  Lamas,  to  the  ordinary  Tibe- 
tan mind,  "Om  mani  pad  me  haun"  is  only  known  in 
that  sense,  and  as  a  prayer  for  the  wellbeing  of  the  six 
classes  of  creatures, —  to  wit,  human  beings,  animals,  evil 
spirits,  souls  in  heaven,  souls  in  purgatory,  and  souls  in 
hell.  Koeppen  does  not  seem  to  have  been  aware  of  this 
special  application  of  the  prayer  as  it  is  now  used,  but 
that  is  really  the  meaning  universally  associated  with  it ; 
and  so  it  comes  to  be  an  aspiration  of  universal  benevo- 
lence, which  is  supposed  to  have  a  protecting  influence 
on  those  who  give  utterance  to  it,  or  reproduce  it  in 
any  way.  The  original  meaning  of  a  charm  of  this  kind 
does  not  much  matter  when  once  it  obtains  general 
acceptance  ;  and  it  is  quite  in  accordance  with  the  pecu- 
liar value  attached  to  it,  that  the  reproduction  of  it  on 
stones,  flags,  and  rolls  of  paper,  should  be  regarded  as 
religious  worship,  as  well  as  the  oral  repetition  of  it. 

It  is  in  this  way  that  the  prayer-wheels  and  prayer- 
mills  are  used.  These  cylinders  are  filled  with  rolls  of 
paper,  on  which  this  prayer,  and  occasionally  other 
charms,  are  written  many  times,  and  the  turning  them 
from  left  to  right  is  supposed  to  be  a  means  of  offering 
up  the  prayer.    The  Lamas  keep  constantly  repeating  it 

R 


258  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

when  turning  their  hand-cylinders  upon  an  axis  which 
they  grasp  below.  These  cylinders  are  very  often  shortly 
called  "  Mani,"  a  word  which  is  loosely  applied  to  many 
matters  connected  with  the  Lama  religion  ;  but,  accord- 
ing to  Cunningham,  their  proper  designation  is  "  Mani 
—  chhos  —  khor,"  or  the  "  precious  religious  wheel." 
This  agrees  with  Koeppen,  who  adds,  that  they  are  not 
originally  Tibetan,  but  were  used  in  India  four  hundred 
years  before  the  Christian  era.  On  that  latter  point, 
however,  he  gives  no  authority  for  his  statement,  which 
is  opposed  to  the  opinion  of  Klaproth,  and  of  such  an 
experienced  archaeologist  as  Cunningham,  who  says  of 
the  prayer-cylinder,  "  I  can  vouch  that  I  have  never  seen 
it  represented  on  any  piece  of  Indian  sculpture."  I  un- 
derstand that  about  Darjiling  it  is  not  difficult  to  get 
prayer-cylinders,  but  they  are  probably  manufactured 
specially  for  the  foreign  market.  Mr  Heyde  told  me  that 
the  only  way  in  which  he. had  been  able  to  supply  the 
demand  of  friends  for  them  was  to  get  them  manufac- 
tured ;  and  all  my  efforts  to  purchase  from  Lamas  a 
specimen  which  had  been  in  use  were  entirely  fruitless. 

Our  next  day's  journey  to  the  Talukdar's  village  of 
Thesur  was  a  sort  of  honorary  procession,  and  the  path 
was  pretty  good,  though  there  were  some  ugly  ravines 
and  high  banks  above  the  river.  Before  reaching  Thesur 
we  had  to  cross  to  the  left  bank  of  the  Kharjak  Chu, 
and  this  was  not  easily  accomplished.  The  stream  was 
broad,  and  so  rapid  that  a  single  man  on  horseback 
might  have  been  swept  away;  so  we  had  to  join  hands 
and  go  over  in  an  extended  line — the  riders,  so  to  speak, 
supporting  the  horses,  and  the  action  of  the  whole  party 
preventing  any  individual  steed  from  being  carried  down. 
There  were  no  trees  at  this  village,  but  the  houses  were 
large,  and  there  were  a  number  of  sloping  but  hardly 
terraced    fields.      The    next    morning    took    us    to    the 


ZANSKAR.  259 


junction  of  the  Kharjak  Chu  with  the  Tsarap  Lingti, 
before  which  we  passed  the  Yal  bridge,  one  of  single 
rope,  on  which  a  man  had  all  the  appearance  of  flying 
through  the  air,  as  the  slope  from  one  side  was  consider- 
able. The  junction  of  the  two  rivers  was  a  beautiful 
scene.  On  the  right,  the  Pune  Gonpa,  or  monastery, 
had  a  picturesque  castellated  appearance;  and  the 
water  of  the  Tsarap  Lingti  was  of  a  clear,  deep  blue, 
with  long,  large,  deep  pools.  The  stream  we  had 
descended  was  of  a  muddy  grey  colour  ;  and  for  some 
way  after  their  junction,  the  distinction  between  the 
water  of  the  two  rivers  was  as  marked  as  it  is  at  the 
junction  of  the  Rhone  and  the  Arve  beneath  the  Lake 
of  Geneva  ;  but  (as  is  usual  in  unions  between  human 
beings  of  similarly  dissimilar  character)  the  coarse  and 
muddy  river  soon  gained  the  advantage,  and  polluted 
the  whole  stream.  Probably  there  is  a  lake  up  in  that 
unsurveyed  part  of  the  mountains  from  whence  the 
Tsarap  Lingti  descends,  and  hence  its  waters  are  so 
pure  ;  for  the  rocks  between  which  it  ran  are  of  the  same 
character  as  those  of  its  muddy  tributary.  Shortly  after 
we  passed  Char  (12,799  feet),  perched  most  picturesquely 
on  the  other  side  of  the  river,  but  connected  with  our 
side  by  a  very  well  constructed  and  easy  jhula.  Im- 
mediately after,  there  was  a  camping-ground,  and  some 
attempt  was  made  at  a  change  of  bigarries,  but  the  Char 
people  refused  to  have  anything  to  do  with  the  burden 
of  our  effects.  I  found  my  tent  pitched  at  the  little 
village  of  Suley,  on  a  very  small,  windy,  exposed  plat- 
form, about  a  thousand  feet  above  the  river,  and  had 
it  moved  on  again.  We  then  passed  down  into  a  tre- 
mendous ravine,  at  the  bottom  of  which  there  was  a 
narrow  deep  gorge  choked  up  with  pieces  of  rock,  be- 
neath which  a  large  mountain  stream  foamed  and 
thundered.     Soon  after,  we  reached  a  bad,  but  sheltered 


26o  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

and  warm  camping-ground,  on  the  brink  of  the  Tsarap 
Lingti,  and  there  stayed  for  the  night,  the  Suley  people 
bringing  us  supplies.  The  next  day  took  us  over  very 
difficult  ground,  with  no  villages  on  our  side  of  the  river, 
but  with  Dargong  and  Itchor  on  the  other.  We  camped 
at  the  village  of  Mune,  beside  a  fine  grove  of  willow- 
trees,  the  first  I  had  seen  in  Zanskar,  and  near  the  Mune 
Gonpa,  the  Lamas  of  which  were  indisposed  to  allow  me 
to  examine  their  retreat.  The  next  day  took  me  to 
Padam,  over  similar  ground.  We  descended  by  a  steep 
slope,  dangerous  for  riding,  into  the  valley  of  the  Tenia 
Tokpho,  and  crossed  that  river  just  above  its  confluence. 
Soon  after,  the  great  Burdun  Gonpa  appeared,  where 
also  objection  was  made  to  my  admission;  and,  on 
approaching  Padam,  I  had  the  great  pleasure  of  seeing 
a  few  square  miles  of  level  ground,  which,  though  it  was 
in  great  part  covered  with  white  stones,  afforded  much 
relief  to  a  mind  somewhat  overburdened  with  preCipice- 
walls  and  gorges.  At  Padam  we  were  told  to  camp  in 
a  very  unsuitable  place  half  a  mile  from  the  town,  among 
fields  which  next  morning  were  flooded  with  water  ;  but 
I  would  not  do  so,  and  found  a  delightful  camping- 
ground  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  to  the  west  of  the 
town,  on  a  fine  grassy  terrace  under  the  shelter  of  an 
immense  rock,  which  completely  protected  us  from  the 
wind. 

This  capital  of  Zanskar  may  be  called  a  town,  or  even 
a  city,  as  matters  go  in  the  Himaliya,  and  was  at  least 
the  largest  village  I  had  seen  since  leaving  Shipki  in 
Chinese  Tibet.  It  has  a  population  of  about  2000,  and 
is  the  residence  of  a  Thanadar,  who  governs  the  whole 
province  as  representative  of  the  Maharajah  of  Kashmir, 
and  who  is  supported  by  a  small  force  of  horse  and  foot 
soldiers.  In  the  afternoon  this  Mohammedan  official 
called,  and  presented  a  Jiaziir  of  Baltistan  apricots,  and 


ZANSKAR.  261 


said  he  would  send  a  sozvar  or  trooper  with  me  to  Suru 
in  order  to  prevent  any  difficulty  on  the  way.  He  was 
civil  and  agreeable,  and  was  specially  interested  in  my 
revolver;  but  I  did  not  get  much  information  out  of  him 
beyond  learning  that  in  winter  the  people  of  Padam 
were  pretty  well  snowed  up  in  their  houses  ;  and,  if  that 
be  the  case  there,  at  a  height  of  only  11,373  feet,  what 
must  it  be  in  the  villages  which  are  over  13,000  feet  high  ? 
No  province  could  be  much  more  secluded  than  Zan- 
skar  is.  The  tremendous  mountains  which  bound  it, 
the  high  passes  which  have  to  be  crossed  in  order  to 
reach  it,  and  its  distance  (both  linear  and  practical)  from 
any  civilised  region,  cut  it  completely  off  from  the 
foreign  influences  which  are  beginning  to  affect  some 
districts  of  even  the  Himaliya.  There  is  a  want  of  any 
progressive  element  in  itself,  and  its' Tibetan-Budhist 
people  are  in  opposition  to  the  influence  of  Mohammedan 
Kashmir.  It  yields  some  small  revenue  to  the  Maharajah; 
but  the  authority  of  his  officers  and  soldiers  in  it  is  very 
small,  and  they  are  there  very  much  by  sufferance.  It 
is  the  same  in  the  Tibetan  portion  of  Surii;  but  when  I 
got  over  the  long,  wild,  habitationless  tract  which  lies 
between  the  Ringdom  monastery  and  the  village  of 
Surii,  among  a  population  who  were  more  Kashmir  and 
Mohammedan  than  Tibetan  and  Budhist,  I  found  an 
immense  change  in  the  relations  between  the  people  on 
the  one  hand  and  the  soldiers  on  the  other.  The  former 
were  exceedingly  afraid  of  the  soldiers,  and  the  latter 
oppressed  the  people  very  much  as  they  pleased.  There 
was  nothing  of  that,  however,  visible  in  Zanskar,  where 
the  zemindars  paid  little  respect  to  the  soldiers,  and 
appeared  to  manage  the  affairs  of  the  country  them- 
selves, much  as  the  zemindars  do  in  other  districts  of 
the  Himaliya  which  are  entirely  free  from  Mohammedan 
control. 


262  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

According  to  Cunningham,  Zanskar  has  an  area  of 
3C00  square  miles,  and  a  mean  elevation  of  13,1 54  feet,  as 
deduced  from  seven  observations  made  along  "  the  course 
of  the  valley  ;"  but  in  no  sense  can  it  be  correctly  spoken 
of  as  one  valley  ;  for  it  is  composed  of  three  great  valleys. 
Taking  Padam  as  a  centre,  one  of  these  runs  up  the 
courseof  the  Tsarap  Lingti,  which  we  have  just  descended; 
another,  which  we  are  about  to  ascend,  lies  along  the 
upper  Zanskar  river,  up  towards  the  Pense-la  Pass  and 
Suni  ;  while  a  third  is  the  valley  of  the  Zanskar  river 
proper,  which  is  formed  by  the  junction  of  the  two 
streams  just  mentioned  :  these,  when  conjoined,  flow  in 
a  nearly  northern  direction  towards  the  upper  Indus.  In 
shape,  this  province  is  something  like  the  three  legs  of 
the  Manx  coat  of  arms.  Its  greatest  length  must  be 
nearly  ninety  miles,  and  its  mean  breadth  must  be  over 
fifty  ;  but  this  gives  no  idea  of  what  it  is  to  the  traveller, 
who  has  to  follow  the  course  of  the  rivers  and  meets  with 
difficult  ground.  It  took  me  ten  marches  to  get  from 
one  end  of  Zanskar  to  the  other  ;  and  no  one  with  loaded 
coolies  could  have  done  it  in  less  than  nine.  Cunning- 
ham translates  the  name  Zanskar,  or  rather  "  Zangs-kar," 
as  "  white  copper,"  or  brass ;  but  an  enthusiastic  Gaelic 
scholar  suggests  to  me  that  it  is  the  same  as  Sanquhar 
of  Scotland,  and  has  a  similar  meaning.  This  latter 
supposition  may  seem  very  absurd  at  first  sight,  Tibetan 
being  a  Turanian,  and  Gaelic  an  Aryan  language  ;  but 
his  contention  only  is  that  the  names  of  innumerable 
places  in  Tibet  and  Tartary  are  identical  with  the  local 
names  of  the  Gaelic  language;  and  for  almost  every 
Tibetan  name  I  mentioned  to  him  he  found  a  Gaelic 
synonym,  having  a  meaning  which  suited  the  character 
of  the  Tibetan  localities  very  appropriately.  I  cannot 
do  more  than  refer  to  this  matter  here,  but  should  not  be 
surprised  if  this  view  were  borne  out  by  a  strictly  scien- 


ZANSKAR.  263 


tific  investigation  of  the  subject ;  for  it  struck  me  forcibly 
before  I  left  Zanskar  that  there  must  be  some  unknown 
relationship  between  the  people  of  that  province  and  the 
Scottish  Highlanders.  The  sound  of  their  language,  the 
brooches  which  fasten  their  plaids,  the  varieties  of  tartan 
which  their  woollen  clothes  present,  and  even  the  fea- 
tures of  the  people  (which  are  of  an  Aryan  rather  than 
a  Tartar  type),  strongly  reminded  me  of  the  Scotch 
Highlanders.  The  men  had  tall  athletic  forms,  long 
faces,  aquiline  noses  ;  and  the  garments  of  the  women  in 
particular  presented  many  of  the  clan  tartans,  though 
the  check  was  not  so  common  as  the  stripe.  Division  of 
races  and  of  languages  have  been  employed  of  late  to  an 
unscientific  extreme;  and  there  is  nothing  improbable 
in  the  supposition  that  a  particular  Himaliyan  tribe,  of 
mixed  Aryan  and  Turanian  blood,  speaking  a  mixed 
language,  which  became  almost  entirely  Aryan  as  they 
advanced,  but  preserving  especially  the  local  names  of 
their  Tibetan  birthplace,  with  some  peculiarities  of  dress 
and  custom,  may  have  pushed  their  way  along  the 
"  Stony  Girdle  of  the  Earth  "  to  the  islands  (if  they  were 
then  islands)  of  the  Western  Sea.  R  and  n  being  inter- 
changeable, and  as  words  signifying  crossing  or  weaving 
across,  it  is  not  absolutely  impossible  that  tartan  may 
have  some  relationship  to  Tartar,  the  name  of  the  cloth 
being  taken  from  that  of  the  people  who  wore  it.  This  is 
about  as  likely  as  the  usual  derivation  of  tartan  from  the 
French  tiretaine;  but  it  would  be  almost  as  unwarrant- 
able to  affirm  it  without  some  positive  indication  of  its 
having  been  the  case,  as  it  would  be  to  accept  the  deri- 
vation of  an  ingenious  and  learned  friend  who  insists 
that  the  word  tartan  obtained  its  present  application 
when  the  Assyrian  General  Tartan  (Isa.  xx.  1-4)  took 
Ashdod,  and  carried  away  the  Egyptians  captive  in  an 
imperfectly  clothed  condition,  which  must   have   made 


264  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


them  bear  a  striking  resemblance  to  Scotch  Highlanders 
in  their  national  costume. 

Starting  from  Padam  in  the  afternoon  of  the  next  day, 
we  proceeded  in  a  north-westerly  direction  up  the  pretty 
level,  open  valley  of  the  upper  Zanskar  river,  and  camped 
at  Seni  Gonpa,  where  there  is  a  small  village.  The  next 
day  also,  on  the  journey  to  Phe,  the  road  was  good,  and 
the  valley  pleasant,  but  we  had  to  cross  to  the  left  bank 
of  the  river  by  a  long  and  difficult  j/ai /a.  It  was  amusing 
to  notice  the  looks  of  the  dogs  as,  wrapt  in  plaids,  they 
were  unwillingly  carried  over  on  the  backs  of  coolies; 
and  one  of  my  servants  became  so  nervous  in  the  middle, 
that  he  was  unable  to  go  either  backwards  or  forwards, 
until  one  of  the  mountaineers  was  sent  to  his  assistance. 
After  passing  two  villages,  we  came  on  a  long  stretch  of 
uninhabited  ground  that  extended  to  Phe,  and  here  met 
with  the  commencement  of  a  tremendous  snowstorm, 
which,  on  and  about  the  16th  and  17th  September,  swept 
over  the  whole  line  of  the  western  Himaliya  from  Kash- 
mir, at  least  as  far  as  the  Barra  Lacha  Pass,  closing  the 
passes,  and  preventing  the  Yarkund  traders  from  getting 
down  to  Simla,  as  noted  in  the  Indian  newspapers  at  the 
time.  Such  a  snowstorm  is  not  usual  so  early  in  the  season, 
but  the  Zanskaries  said  it  occasionally  occurred.  It  had 
often  struck  me  how  little  attention  the  people  of  the 
Himaliya  paid  to  the  weather,  and  how  ignorant  they 
were  of  its  signs  ;  and  the  present  occasion  was  no  ex- 
ception to  that  rule,  as  the  storm  appeared  to  take  our 
party  quite  by  surprise.  The  morning  had  been  cold 
and  dark,  but  with  that  peculiar  thickening  of  the  air 
which  indicates  the  gathering  of  snow.  As  we  advanced 
up  the  valley,  an  ocean  of  mist  began  to  hurry  across  it 
from  the  glaciers  and  snowy  mountains  on  the  left  or 
south-western  side,  but  admitting,  at  first,  occasional 
gleams  of  sickly  sunlight,  which  soon  disappeared  alto- 


ZANSKAR.  265 


gether.  At  first,  also,  there  was  almost  no  wind  where 
we  were,  though  it  was  blowing  a  hurricane  above,  and 
the  mist  rushed  over  from  the  one  snowy  range  to  the 
other  with  marvellous  rapidity.  After  a  time,  however, 
violent  gusts  of  wind  and  blasts  of  rain  came  down  upon 
us  ;  the  rain  changed  into  sleet  ;  a  violent  wind  blew 
steadily  ;  and  before  we  reached  the  village  of  Phe  it  was 
snowing  heavily.  To  camp  in  our  tents  in  these  circum- 
stances was  not  desirable  ;  and  the  sowar  whom  the 
Thanadar  of  Padam  had  given  me  prevailed  on  the 
principal  zemindar  of  Phe  to  allow  us  to  take  up  our 
quarters  in  his  house  ;  and  there  we  had  to  stay  until 
the  day  after  next,  when  the  force  of  the  storm  had  ex- 
hausted itself. 

This  house,  which  was  a  typical  Tibetan  residence 
of  the  better  class,  was  built  of  stone,  without  mortar, 
but  interspersed  by  large  beams,  which  must  have  been 
brought  from  a  distance,  and  which  add  to  the  security 
of  the  edifice.  It  occupied  an  area  of,  I  should  think, 
about  eighty  feet  in  length,  and  sixty  in  breadth,  was 
two-storeyed,  and  had  a  small  courtyard  in  front.  All 
the  lower  rooms  were  occupied  by  ponies,  sheep,  and 
cattle  ;  and  savoury  were  the  smells,  and  discordant  the 
cries,  which  they  sent  upstairs,  or  rather  through  the 
roof  of  their  abode,  during  my  two  days'  confinement 
above.  The  upper  storey  was  reached  by  a  stone  stair- 
case, which  ascended  partly  outside  the  house  and  partly 
inside,  and  which,  in  its  latter  portion,  required  one  to 
stoop  painfully.  Part  of  this  storey,  fronting  the  court- 
yard, had  no  roof,  and  so  formed  a  kind  of  balcony,  one 
end  of  which,  however,  was  roofed  over,  and  afforded 
shelter  and  a  cooking-place  for  my  servants.  From 
that,  a  low  passage,  on  both  sides  of  which  there  were 
some  small  rooms  or  closets,  led  into  the  principal 
apartment  of  the  house,  on  one  side  of  which  there  was 


266  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

another  large  room,  occupied  by  the  women  and  chil- 
dren, with  a  very  small  window  and  balcony.  On 
another  side  there  was  a  storeroom  ;  and  on  the  third 
there  was  a  dark  room  which  was  used  as  a  chapel, 
and  in  which  a  light  was  kept  constantly  burning.  The 
principal  apartment,  in  which  I  took  up  my  residence, 
along  with  the  husbands  of  the  wife,  and  apparently 
any  one  who  might  drop  in,  including  a  Balti  wanderer, 
was  about  forty  feet  long  by  thirty.  It  had  no  window, 
properly  speaking — light,  air,  and,  I  may  add,  snow, 
finding  admission  through  a  square  hole  in  the  roof, 
with  sides  each  about  six  feet.  Directly  below  this,  but 
not  so  large,  there  was  a  corresponding  hole  in  the  floor, 
so  that  a  sort  of  well  ran  down  to  the  ground-floor,  and 
served  to  carry  off  the  rain  and  snow  which  are  ad- 
mitted by  the  hole  in  the  roof.  This  is  an  ingenious 
arrangement,  and  shows  that  the  human  mind  may 
have  some  invention  even  when  it  is  not  equal  to  con- 
ceive of  a  chimney.  The  room  was  just  high  enough  to 
allow  of  a  tall  man  standing  upright  beneath  the  beams; 
and  the  roof  was  about  four  feet  thick,  being  composed 
of  thorn-bushes  pressed  very  closely  together,  and  rest- 
ing on  several  large  strong  beams.  Inside,  the  walls 
were  plastered  with  a  kind  of  coarse  diunavi;  the  floor 
was  composed  of  rafters  and  slabs  of  slate  ;  and  on  the 
floor,  resting  against  one  of  the  walls,  there  were  two  or 
three  small  stone  fireplaces,  which  constituted  the  only 
furniture,  except  one  or  two  chests,  which  served  as 
seats. 

To  say  that  this  was  in  itself  a  pleasant  place  of 
residence  would  be  incorrect.  The  large  aperture  in 
the  centre  of  the  roof  created  a  low  temperature  which 
required  a  fire  to  make  it  tolerable,  but  the  smoke  from 
the  fire  knew  when  it  was  well  off,  and  showed  a  re- 
markable aversion  to  going  out  at  the  aperture.     Con- 


ZANSKAR.  267 


sequently,  there  was  the  alternative  of  being  starved 
with  cold  or  being  occasionally  half  choked  and  blinded 
with  the  pungent  smoke  of  birch  and  thorn  bushes. 
However,  the  smoke,  after  going  up  the  wall,  did  collect 
pretty  close  to  the  roof,  the  inside  of  which  it  had 
covered  with  a  thick  layer  of  soot.  That  was  not 
nearly  so  great  an  evil  as  the  porous  character  of  the 
roof  itself,  through  which  the  snow  soaked  only  too 
easily,  and,  being  thoroughly  melted  by  the  time  it  got 
through  the  roof,  fell  everywhere  into  the  apartment  in 
large,  black,  dirty  drops,  so  that  it  was  somewhat  diffi- 
cult to  find  a  spot  on  which  one  could  keep  dry  or 
clean. 

On  the  second  day,  when  there  was  no  appearance  of 
the  snowstorm  ceasing,  and  there  was  great  probability 
of  my  having  to  spend  a  winter  of  eight  months  in  Phe, 
I  began  seriously  to  consider  what  state  I  should  likely 
be  in  after  so  prolonged  a  residence  in  such  an  apart- 
ment. The  prospect  was  by  no  means  a  pleasant  one, 
and  I  resolved,  if  I  had  to  remain,  to  take  up  my  abode 
in  the  half-covered  balcony.  My  liquors  were  at  their 
last  ebb,  and  my  tea  was  disappearing  ;  but  I  could 
keep  myself  going  in  coffee  by  means  of  roasted  barley, 
and  there  would  be  no  want  of  milk,  meal,  and  mutton. 
Perhaps  a  knowledge  of  the  Tibetan  language  might 
prove  more  useful  to  me  than  that  of  English  ;  and 
an  intelligent  being  might  find  more  satisfaction  as  a 
Nimapa  Lama,  than  as  either  Primate  or  Prime  Minister 
of  England  in  the  present  age. 

The  polyandric  wife  and  mother  of  this  house  kept  to 
the  inner  room  ;  but  there  was  a  delightful  trio  which 
kept  me  company  in  the  public  apartment,  and  was 
composed  of  the  aged  grandmother  and  two  fine  chil- 
dren, a  girl  and  boy  of  five  and  six  years  old  respec- 
tively.    They    were    delicious    children,  fair    almost  as 


268  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

northern  Europeans,  frolicsome  and  wild  whenever  the 
grandmother  was  away  or  not  looking  after  them,  and 
the  next  moment  as  demure  as  mice  when  the  cat  is  in 
the  room.  They  ate  with  great  gusto  enormous  piles 
of  thick  scones  covered  with  fine  rancid  butter.  No 
young  lions  ever  had  a  more  splendid  appetite,  or 
roared  more  lustily  for  their  food.  The  old  woman 
kept  them  winding  yarn  and  repeating  "  Om  mani  pad 
me  haun  ; "  but  the  moment  her  back  was  turned,  they 
would  spring  up,  dance  about,  open  their  sheepskin 
coats  and  give  their  little  plump  rosy  bodies  a  bath  of 
cold  air;  but  when  old  granny,  who  was  blear-eyed 
and  half  blind,  hobbled  back,  they  were  seated  in  their 
places  in  an  instant,  hard  at  work  at  "  Om  mani  pad," 
and  looking  as  if  butter  would  not  melt  in  their  mouths. 
Sometimes  they  would  sit  down  beside  me  and  gaze 
into  the  fire,  with  all  the  wisdom  and  solemnity  of  Biidha 
in  their  countenances  ;  then  the  boy's  naked  foot  would 
noiselessly  steal  out  until  he  caught  a  burning  branch 
between  his  toes,  on  which  the  girl  would  give  him  a 
violent  nudge,  push  him  over,  and  they  would  both 
jump  up  laughing  and  run  away.  The  grandmother 
too  was  interesting.  She  said  she  had  seen  seventy 
years — she  did  not  know  how  many  more,  and  the 
Tibetans  rarely  know  their  own  ages.  There  was  be- 
tween her  and  the  children  that  confidential  relationship 
we  often  see  in  Europe,  and  which,  being  born  of  love, 
creates  no  fear;  and  she  also  found  room  in  her  affec- 
tions for  a  young  kitten,  which  drove  Djeola  almost 
mad.  Though  nearly  blind,  she  plied  her  distaff  in- 
dustriously, and  she  showed  her  piety  by  almost 
continuously  repeating  the  great  Lama  prayer.  It  is 
true  she  never  got  any  farther  than  "  Om  mani  pad," 
thereby  getting  over  more  repetitions  of  it  than  would 
have   been    possible    had    she    pronounced    the   whole 


ZANSKAR.  269 

formula  ;  but  let  us  hope  the  fraud  on  heaven  was 
passed  over.  A  less  agreeable  occupation  in  which  she 
indulged  was  that  of  freeing  her  own  garments  and 
those  of  the  children -from  unpleasant  parasites;  for, 
after  doing  so,  she  always  carefully  placed  them  on  the 
floor  without  injuring  them  ;  for  it  would  never  have 
done  to  neutralise  the  effect  of  the  prayer  for  the  six 
classes  of  beings  by  destroying  any  of  them.  To  the 
looker-on,  this  placing  of  parasites  on  the  floor  is  apt  to 
suggest  foreboding  reflections.  But,  to  tell  the  truth, 
one  gets  accustomed  to  that  sort  of  thing.  Whatever 
care  be  taken,  it  is  impossible  to  travel  for  any  time 
among  the  Himaliya  without  making  the  acquaintance 
of  a  good  many  little  friends.  It  is  impossible  to  de- 
scribe the  shuddering  disgust  with  which  the  discovery 
of  the  first  is  made  ;  but,  by  the  time  you  get  to  the 
five-hundredth,  you  cease  to  care  about  them,  and  take 
it  as  a  matter  of  course.  When  our  bedding  and  all 
our  baggage  is  carried  on  the  backs  of  coolies,  there 
must  be  some  transference  of  that  class  of  parasites 
which  haunt  the  human  body  and  clothes;  but  they  are 
easily  got  rid  of  entirely  when  the  supply  stops. 

Though  the  children  were  so  fair,  the  men  of  the 
house  were  dark  and  long-featured,  with  almost  nothing 
of  the  Tartar  in  their  countenances  ;  but  their  language 
is  quite  Tibetan,  and  I  should  say  that  we  have  here 
a  distinct  instance  of  a  people  who  speak  the  language 
of  an  alien  race,  and  that  alone.  It  will  be  curious  if 
my  supposition  be  correct  that  these  Zanskaries  are  the 
congeners  of  the  Celtic  race,  and  the  subject  is  well 
worthy  of  examination.  I  was  not  admitted  into  the 
room  dedicated  to  religious  purposes,  but  saw  there 
were  Budhist  images,  brass  basins,  and  saucer-lights 
similar  to  those  used  both  by  the  Chinese  and  the 
Indians.     The  young  Balti  who  had  taken  refuge  with 


270  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

us  from  the  storm  displayed  some  honesty,  though  he 
was  going  in  a  different  direction  from  ours  ;  for,  on 
my  giving  him  four  annas  (sixpence)  for  quite  a  number 
of  the  apricots  of  his  country  which  he  had  presented 
me  with,  he  said  that  was  too  much,  and  brought  me 
more  of  his  dried  fruit,  which  must  have  been  carried 
over  a  difficult  journey  of  weeks.  I  met  several  large 
parties  of  Baltis  in  this  part  of  the  Himaliya,  and  was 
struck  by  their^  Jewish  appearance.  Though  Moham- 
medans, their  language  is  Tibetan,  and  Nurdass  had  no 
difficulty  in  talking  with  them.  Here  is  another  in- 
stance where  a  people,  evidently  not  of  a  Tartar  race, 
speak  a  Tartar  language;  and  I  must  again  protest 
against  the  extreme  to  which  the  philologists  have  em- 
ployed the  clue  of  language.  The  Jews  of  China  have 
entirely  lost  their  own  tongue,  and  their  nationality  has 
been  recognised  only  by  two  or  three  customs,  and  by 
their  possession  of  copies  of  the  Pentateuch  —  which 
they  are  unable  to  read.  Such  matters  are  often  as 
well  treated  by  men  of  general  knowledge  and  large 
capacity  of  thought  as  by  the  devotees  of  some  par- 
ticular branch  of  knowledge. 

On  the  second  morning  after  our  arrival  at  Phe  the 
storm  had  entirely  passed  off,  and  a  council  of  the 
villagers  was  held  to  determine  whether  or  not  we 
could  be  got  over  the  Pense-la  Pass.  I  should  have 
been  delighted  to  remain  in  Zanskar  all  winter,  though 
not  in  such  an  apartment  as  I  have  described,  but  was, 
in  a  manner,  bound  in  honour  to  my  servants  to  pro- 
ceed if  it  were  possible  to  do  so  ;  and  the  villagers  were 
anxious  to  see  us  off  their  hands,  for  it  would  have 
been  a  serious  matter  for  them  had  we  remained  all 
winter.  So,  with  a  strong  body  of  bigarrics  and  a 
number  of  ponies  and  cows,  we  started  at  nine  in  the 
morning.      The   open   valley  presented  a  most  lovely 


ZANSKAR.  271 

scene.  Pure  white  snow  rose  up  on  either  side  of  it 
nearly  from  the  river  to  the  tops  of  the  high  mountains, 
dazzling  in  the  sunlight.  Above,  there  was  a  clear, 
brilliant,  blue  sky,  unspotted  by  any  cloud  or  fleck  of 
mist,  but  with  great  eagles  occasionally  flitting  across 
it.  Close  to  the  river  the  snow  had  melted,  or  was 
melting  from  the  grass,  displaying  beautiful  autumn 
flowers  which  had  been  uninjured  by  it  ;  the  moisture 
on  these  flowers  and  on  the  grass  was  sparkling  in  the 
sunlight.  Every  breath  of  the  pure  keen  air  was  ex- 
hilarating ;  and  for  music  we  had  the  gush  of  snow- 
rivulets,  and  the  piping  of  innumerable  large  marmots, 
which  came  out  of  their  holes  on  the  sides  of  the  valley, 
and  whistled  to  each  other.  It  was  more  like  an  Alpine 
scene  in  spring  than  in  autumn,  and  reminded  me  of 
Beattie's  lines  describing  the  outbreak  of  a  Lapland 
spring : — 

"  Thus  on  the  chill  Lapponian's  dreary  land, 
For  many  a  long  month  lost  in  snow  profound, 
When  Sol  from  Cancer  sends  the  seasons  bland, 
And  in  their  northern  cave  the  storms  are  bound, 
From  silent  mountains,  straight,  with  startling  sound, 
Torrents  are  hurled  ;  green  hills  emerge  ;  and,  lo  I 
The  trees  with  foliage,  cliffs  with  flowers  are  crowned, 
Pure  rills  through  vales  of  verdure  warbling  flow." 

On  reaching  the  last  village,  called  Abring,  it  was 
determined  not  to  stay  there,  but  to  camp  as  high  up 
on  the  pass  as  we  could  reach  before  nightfall,  in  order 
to  have  the  whole  of  the  next  day  for  getting  over  the 
deep  snow  with  which  its  summit  was  covered.  On 
ascending  from  the  larger  valley,  we  passed  through  a 
number  of  picturesque  small  vales,  and  then  got  on  a 
more  open  track,  on  one  side  of  which,  where  there  were 
some  birch-bushes,  we  camped  at  eve.  My  tent  had  to 
be  pitched  on  snow ;   and  I  may  say  that  for  the  next 


272  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

seven  days,  or  until  I  reached  Dras,  I  was  very  little  off 
that  substance  ;  and  for  six  nights  my  tent  was  either 
pitched  on  snow,  or  on  ground  which  had  been  swept 
clear  of  it  for  the  purpose.  At  this  camp  on  the 
Pense-la,  darkness  came  on  (there  being  only  a  crescent 
moon  in  the  early  morning)  before  our  preparations  for 
the  night  were  concluded.  My  thermometer  sank  to 
22°,  and  there  was  something  solemn  suggested  on 
looking  into  the  darkness  and  along  the  great  snowy 
wastes.  My  bigarries  were  very  much  afraid  of  bears, 
saying  that  the  place  was  haunted  by  them ;  but  none 
appeared. 

Starting  early  next  morning,  we  passed  through  seve- 
ral miles  of  thick  brushwood,  chiefly  birch  and  willow, 
just  before  we  approached  the  col  of  the  Pense-la  Pass. 
A  great  glacier  flowed  over  it,  and  for  some  way  our 
ascent  lay  up  the  rocky  slopes  to  the  right  side  of  this 
ice-stream  ;  but  that  was  tedious  work,  and  when  we  got 
up  a  certain  distance,  and  the  snow  was  thick  enough  to 
support  us,  we  moved  on  to  the  glacier  itself,  and  so 
made  the  remainder  of  the  ascent.  The  fall  of  snow 
here  had  been  tremendous.  I  probed  in  vain  with  my 
seven  feet  long  alpenstock  to  strike  the  ice  beneath  ;  but 
every  now  and  then  a  crevasse,  too  large  to  be  bridged 
by  the  snow,  showed  the  nature  of  the  ground  we  were 
on.  I  fancy  this  was  the  most  dangerous  ground  I  rode 
over  in  all  the  Himaliya,  for  the  snow  over  a  crevasse 
might  have  given  way  beneath  a  horse  and  his  rider; 
but  several  of  the  Zanskar  men  were  riding  and  did  not 
dismount,  so  I  was  fain  to  trust  to  this  local  knowledge, 
though  I  did  not  put  any  confidence  in  it.  Not  far  from 
the  top  of  the  pass  we  came  upon  a  beautiful  little  lake 
in  the  glacier,  sunk  within  walls  of  blue  ice,  and  frozen, 
but  with  the  snow  which  had  fallen  and  the  upper  ice  of 
its  surface  all  melted  ;  for  by  this  time  the  power  of 


ZANSKAR.  273 


the  sunbeams  in  the  rarefied  atmosphere,  and  of  their 
reflection  from  the  vast  sheets  of  pure  white  snow,  was 
something  tremendous.  I  had  ort  blue  goggles  to  pro- 
tect my  eyes,*  and  a  double  muslin  veil  over  my  face, 
yet  all  the  skin  on  my  face  was  destroyed.  After  cross- 
ing this  pass,  my  countenance  became  very  much  like 
an  over-roasted  leg  of  mutton  ;  and  as  to  my  hands,  the 
mere  sight  of  them  would  have  made  a  New  Zealander's 
teeth  water.  On  my  Indian  servants  the  only  effect  was 
to  blacken  their  faces,  and  make  their  eyes  bloodshot. 
The  top  of  the  Pense-la  is  only  14,440  feet  high,  but  it 
took  us  a  long  time  to  reach  it,  our  horses  sinking  up  to 
their  girths  in  the  snow  at  almost  ever)'-  step,  and  the 
leader  having  to  be  frequently  changed.  We  have  been 
told  to  pray  that  our  flight  should  not  be  in  the  winter  ; 
and  certainly  in  a  Himaliyan  winter  it  would  not  be 
possible  to  fly  either  quickly  or  far  without  the  wings  of 
eagles.  The  deep  dark  blue  of  the  heavens  above  con- 
trasted with  the  perfect  and  dazzling  whiteness  of  the 
earthly  scene  around.  The  uniformity  of  colour  in  this 
exquisite  scene  excited  no  sense  of  monotony ;' and, 
looking  on  the  beautiful  garment  of  snow  which  covered 
the  mountains  and  glaciers,  but  did  not  conceal  their 
forms,  one  might  well  exclaim — 

"  It  seems  the  Eternal  Soul  is  clothed  in  thee 
With  purer  robes  than  those  of  flesh  and  blood." 

Especially  striking  was  the  icy  spire  of  one  of  the  two 
Akun  (the  Ser  and  Mer)  peaks,  the  highest  of  the 
Western  Himaliya,  which  rose  up   before  us  in  Suru  to 


*  There  was  another  use  to  which  I  found  goggles  could  be  put.  Tibetan 
mastiffs  were  afraid  of  them.  The  fiercest  dog  in  the  Himaliya  will  skulk 
away  terrified  if  you  walk  up  to  it  quietly  in  perfect  silence  with  a  pair  of 
dark-coloured  goggles  on,  and  as  if  you  meditated  some  villany  ;  but  to 
utter  a  word  goes  far  to  break  the  spell. 


274  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

the  height  of  23,477  feet.  I  did  not  get  another  glimpse 
of  it ;  but  from  this  side  it  appeared  to  be  purely  a  spire 
of  glittering  ice,  no  rock  whatever  being  visible,  and  the 
sky  was — 

"  Its  own  calm  home,  its  crystal  shrine, 
Its  habitation  from  eternity." 

But  instead  of  attempting  further  description,  let  me 
quote  an'  older  traveller,  and  give  Hiouen  Tsang's 
description  of  what  he  beheld  on  the  Musur  Dabaghan 
mountain  as  applicable  to  what  I  saw  from,  and  expe- 
rienced on,  the  Pense-la,  and  still  more  especially  on  the 
Shinkal : — "  The  top  of  the  mountain  rises  to  the  sky. 
Since  the  beginning  of  the  world  the  snow  has  been 
accumulating,  and  is  now  transformed  into  vast  masses 
of  ice,  which  never  melt  either  in  spring  or  summer. 
Hard  and  brilliant  sheets  of  snow  are  spread  out  till  they 
are  lost  in  the  infinite  and  mingle  with  the  clouds.  If 
one  looks  at  them,  the  eyes  are  dazzled  by  the  splendour. 
Frozen  peaks  hang  down  over  both  sides  of  the  path 
some  hundred  feet  high  and  twenty  or  thirty  feet  thick. 
It  is  not  without  difficulty  or  danger  that  the  traveller 
can  clear  them  or  climb  over  them.  Besides,  there  are 
squalls  of  wind  and  tornadoes  of  snow  which  attack  the 
pilgrims.  Even  with  double  shoes  and  with  thick  furs 
one  cannot  help  trembling  and  shivering." 

In  front  of  us  immense  sheets  of  snow  stretched 
steeply  into  3  narrow  valley,  and  down  one  of  these  we 
plunged  in  a  slanting  direction.  It  was  too  late  to  reach 
the  neighbourhood  of  any  human  habitations  that  night ; 
but  we  descended  the  valley  for  several  miles  till  we 
came  to  brushwood  and  a  comparatively  warm  camping- 
spot,  well  satisfied  at  having  got  over  the  Pense-la  with- 
out a  single  accident.  Where  I  was  to  go  next,  however, 
was  a  matter  of  some  anxiety ;  for  here  the  elevated 
valley  theory  began  to  break  down,  and  we  were  in  front 


ZANSKAR.  275 


of  a  confused  congeries  of  mountains,  which  must  be 
difficult  enough  to  cross  at  any  time,  but  tenfold  so 
after  such  a  snowstorm  as  had  just  swept  over  the 
Himaliya.  I  felt  especially  uneasy  about  those  unknown 
places,  of  which  Mr  Heyde  had  said,  "  they  might  be,  a 
little  difficult  to  get  over."  From  this  point  where  we 
now  were,  I  had  proposed  to  go,  in  a  south-westerly 
direction,  over  the  Chiling  Pass  to  Petgam  in  Maru  Ward- 
wan,  from  whence  it  would  not  have  been  difficult  to 
reach  Islamabad  in  the  south  of  Kashmir ;  but  the  Zans- 
kar  men  declared  that  there  was  no  such  pass,  no  pas- 
sage in  that  direction  ;  and  it  was  at  least  clearly  evi- 
dent that  the  habitationless  villages  leading  that  way 
were  so  blocked  up  with  prodigious  masses  of  snow, 
that  they  had  become  quite  impracticable  till  next 
summer.  I  was  thus  compelled  to  proceed  northwards, 
and  to  strike  the  road  from  Leh  to  Kashmir,  and  camped 
that  day  at  a  small  village  near  to  the  great  Ringdom 
Gonpa.  I  was  permitted  to  enter  and  examine  this 
monastery,  but  must  reserve  an  account  of  it.  From 
there  it  took  me  three  easy  marches  through  beautiful 
open  valleys  to  reach  the  village  and  fort  of  Suru. 
The  first  two  days  were  over  uninhabited  ground  ;  and 
we  camped  the  first  night  at  Gulmatongo,  where  there 
are  some  huts  occupied  by  herdsmen  in  summer.  This 
place  is  the  most  advanced  post  in  that  direction  of  the 
Tibetan-speaking  people  and  of  the  Lama  religion  ;  for 
the  village  of  Parkatze,  where  we  camped  next  night,  is 
inhabited  chiefly  by  Kashmiri  Mohammedans,  and  at 
Surii  there  is  a  Kashmiri  Thanadar  and  a  military  force. 
In  these  valleys  there  are  immense  numbers  of  large 
marmots,  called  pia  by  the  Tibetans,  from  the  peculiar 
sound  they  make.  We  shot  several  of  them,  and  found 
their  brown  fur  to  be  very  soft  and  thick.  There  was  no 
difficulty  in  shooting  them,  but  some  in  gaining  posses- 


276  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

sion  of  them,  for  they  were  always  close  to  the  entrance 
cf  their  holes,  and  escaped  down  these  unless  killed  out- 
right. The  people  do  not  eat  them,  considering  them  to 
be  a  species  of  rat ;  and  though  the  skins  are  valued,  this 
animal  does  not  seem  to  be  hunted.  The  skins  I  procured 
disappeared  at  Suru,  the  theft  being  laid  to  the  charge  of 
a  dog  ;  and  though  half  my  effects  were  carried  in  open 
kiltas,  this  was  the  only  loss  I  experienced  on  my  long 
journey,  with  the  exception  of  a  tin  of  bacon  which  dis- 
appeared in  Lahaul,  and  which  also  was  debited  to  a 
canine  thief.  The  Himaliyan  marmots  were  larger  than 
hares,  though  proportionably  shorter  in  the  body.  They 
were  so  fat  at  this  season  that  they  could  only  waddle, 
having  fed  themselves  up  on  the  grass  of  summer  in  pre- 
paration for  their  long  hybernation  in  winter.  They 
undoubtedly  communicate  with  one  another  by  their 
shrill  cries,  and  have  a  curiously  intelligent  air  as  they 
sit  watching  and  piping  at  the  mouth  of  their  subter- 
ranean abodes.  The  marmot  has  a  peculiar  interest  as 
one  of  the  unchanged  survivors  of  that  period  when 
the  megatherium,  the  sivatherium,  and  the  other  great 
animals  whose  fossil  remains  are  found  in  the  Siwalick 
range,  were  roaming  over  the  Himaliyas,  or  over  the 
region  where  these  now  rise. 

Shortly  before  reaching  Suru  we  had  to  leave  the  bed 
of  the  Suru  river,  which  takes  its  rise  near  Gulmatongo, 
and  had  to  make  a  detour  and  considerable  ascent.  The 
cause  of  this  was  an  enormous  glacier,  which  came  down 
into  the  river  on  the  opposite  (the  left)  bank,  and  de- 
flected the  stream  from  its  course.  Splendid  walls  of 
ice  were  thus  exposed,  and  here  also  there  is  likely  to 
be  a  cataclysm  ere  long.  Surii  is  only  a  dependency  of 
Kashmir,  and  there  were  more  snow-covered  mountain- 
ranges  to  be  crossed  before  I  could  repose  in  the  Valley 
of  Flowers  ;  but  at  this  place  I  had  fairly  passed  out  of 


ZANSKAR.  177 

the  Tibetan  region,  and  without,  so  far  as  I  am  aware, 
having  become  either  a  Lama  or  a  Bodhisavata.  I  may- 
say  that,  while  it  has  unrivalled  scenery,  its  people  also 
are  interesting,  and  manage  wonderfully  well  with  their 
hard  and  trying  life. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

KASHMIR. 

ALMOST  every  one  longs,  and  many  hope,  to  see  the 
beautiful  Vale  of  Kashmir.  Probably  no  region  of  the 
earth  is  so  well  known  to  the  eye  of  imagination,  or  so 
readily  suggests  the  idea  of  a  terrestrial  Paradise.  So 
far  from  having  been  disappointed  with  the  reality,  or 
having  experienced  any  cause  for  wishing  that  I  had 
left  Kashmir  unvisited,  I  can  most  sincerely  say  that 
the  beautiful  reality  excels  the  somewhat  vague  poetic 
vision  which  has  been  associated  with  the  name.  But 
Kashmir  is  rather  a  difficult  country  to  get  at,  espe- 
cially when  you  come  down  upon  it  from  behind,  by 
way  of  Zanskar  and  Sum.  According  to  tradition,  it 
was  formerly  the  Garden  of  Eden  ;  and  one  is  very  well 
disposed  to  accept  that  theory  when  trying  to  get  into 
it  from  the  north  or  north-west.  Most  people  go  up 
to  it  from  the  plains  of  India  by  one  of  the  four 
authorised  routes ;  but  I  have  a  habit  of  getting  into 
places  by  some  quite  unusual  way,  and  did  so  in  this 
instance. 

From  Sum  to  Kartse  and  Sanku,  a  day's  journey,  the 
road  was  not  bad,  except  at  one  place,  where  I  had 
to  ride  high  up  the  mountains  in  order  to  find  a  path 
possible  for  ponies,  and  at  another  where  the  path  was 
so  narrow,  running  athwart  precipices  and  nearly  pre- 
cipitous slopes  of  shingle,  that  a  man  whom  I  met 
leading  his  pony  along  it,  had  to  take  his  steed  back 
for  more  than  a  mile  before  the  two  ponies  could  pass 


KASHMIR.  279 


each  other.  At  Sanku  there  was  a  fine  grove  of  trees 
for  a  camping-ground,  giving  promise  of  a  more  genial 
clime,  though  there  was  snow  lying  under  the  trees; 
and  the  way  from  Sanku  to  Omba,  up  the  valley  of  the 
Nakpo  Chu,  was  tolerably  easy  ;  but  after  leaving  Omba 
I  did  come  upon  some  places  which  were  "  a  little  diffi- 
cult to  get  over."  Unfortunately  I  had  no  proper  map 
of  that  part  of  the  country  ;  and,  starting  early  from 
Sanku,  we  reached  the  mountain  village  of  Omba  at 
half-past  ten  in  the  morning.  That  seemed  rather  a 
short  day's  journey,  so  I  asked  one  of  the  coolies,  who 
spoke  a  little  Hindusthani,  how  far  it  was  from  Omba  to 
Dras,  and  he  said  it  was  the  same  distance  as  we  had 
come  from  Sanku  to  Omba,  and  further  illustrated  his 
meaning  by  grasping  my  alpenstock  by  the  middle,  and 
indicating  the  two  halfs  of  it  as  illustrations  of  the  equal 
length  of  the  two  distances.  When  I  afterwards  re- 
proached this  man  for  the  difficulty  into  which  he  had 
led  us,  he  answered,  with  true  Kashmirian  effrontery, 
that  he  had  said  nothing  of  the  kind  ;  that  it  was  a 
Dras-wallah,  a  fellow  from  Dras,  who,  he  alleged,  had 
passed  at  the  time,  that  had  said  so.  But  no  one 
objected  to  our  going  on,  and  all  the  bigarries  showed 
a  remarkable  alacrity  in  starting.  What  on  earth  their 
motive  was,  I  cannot  say  positively.  Perhaps  they 
really  wished  to  get  on  to  Dras  that  day,  from  fear 
of  being  cut  off  from  their  homes  by  a  fall  of  snow ; 
but  it  is  more  probable  that  they  were  afraid  of  going 
there,  and  proposed  to  give  me  the  slip  among  the 
mountains  ;  for  about  this  time  the  envoy  of  the  Yarkund 
ruler  was  expected  to  be  coming  up  the  Dras  valley,  on 
his  return  from  a  visit  to  Constantinople,  and  immense 
numbers  of  Kashmir  coolies  were  being  impressed  in 
order  to  take  his  European  purchases  up  to  Leh.  At  all 
events,  there  must  have   been   some  secret  motive  for 


28o  THE  ABODE  OF  SNUW. 

their  hurrying  me  into  the  injurious  task  of  undertaking 
in  one  day  what  ought  properly  to  have  been  a  three 
days'  journey.  I  was  ignorant  of  the  fact  when  among 
those  mountains;  but  find  now,  that  in  1822,  Moorcroft 
went  over  the  same  road,  and  he  took  three  days  to  it, 
though  it  was  July,  and  he  started  from  above  Sanku, 
and  on  the  third  day  did  not  reach  Dras,  but  only  the 
hamlet  opposite  it,  which  I  reached  in  one  day  from 
Sanku  ;  so  it  can  be  understood  how  tremendous  was 
the  day's  journey,  and  how  great  the  mistake  into  which 
I  was  led. 

So  we  started  from  Omba,  and  began  to  ascend  a 
hill.  I  do  not  say  "a  hill"  sarcastically,  because  had  I 
seen,  soon  after  starting,  what  a  mountain  this  hill  was, 
I  should  immediately  have  turned  back  and  camped  at 
Omba  ;  but,  though  immense  mountains  rose  before  us, 
they  did  so  in  such  a  manner  as  to  make  it  appear  likely 
that  a  low  pass  ran  between  them.  It  was  not  until  we  had 
laboured  up  steadily  for  about  a  couple  of  hours  that  the 
horrible  truth  began  to  dawn  upon  my  mind  that  there 
was  no  pass,  and  that  it  was  up  the  face  of  one  of  those 
gigantic  mountains  that  we  were  now  going  by  a  cork- 
screw path.  There  really  appeared  to  be  no  end  either 
of  the  path  or  of  the  mountain,  and  we  soon  got  involved 
in  large  patches  of  snow,  though  this  was  the  south  side 
of  "  the  pass."  It  was  like  going  up,  not  to  Kashmir, 
but  to  heaven  ;  and  I  should  even  then  have  returned  to 
Omba  but  for  the  consideration  that  the  bigarrics  were 
from  Sanku,  and  that  it  might  be  difficult  to  supply 
their  places  or  to  get  them  to  go  on  next  day.  Mean- 
while they  began  to  show  symptoms  of  distress,  and  two 
or  three  attempted  to  leave  their  luggage  and  bolt.  One 
man  nearly  effected  his  escape  by  getting  leave  to  go 
down  a  little  way  to  a  snow  rivulet  to  drink.  Whenever 
he  got  there,  he  took  to  his  heels  down  the  pass,  but  was 


KASHMIR.  281 


cut  off  and  forced  to  come  back  by  one  of  my  servants, 
who  had  fallen  behind  and  was  coming  up  on  horse- 
back. 

However,  I  ignorantly  thought  that  if  we  got  to  the 
top  of  this  tremendous  Omba-la,  or  Omba  Pass  (which 
was  as  steep,  and  must  have  been  as  high,  as  the  Kung- 
ma,  which  leads  from  Namgea  over  into  Chinese  Tibet), 
it  would  be  all  right ;  and  so  I  encouraged  the  bigarries  to 
labour  upwards.  There  was  deep  snow  at  the  summit ; 
and  looking  down  the  northern  side,  an  immense  sheet 
of  snow  was  seen  stretching  down  into  a  desolate  valley, 
and  broken  only  by  the  track  of  a  party  of  Baltis  we 
met  at  the  summit.  One  of  these  was  crying  bitterly, 
and  on  inquiring  into  the  cause,  I  found  he  had  been 
struck  with  snow-blindness  by  the  reflection  of  the  sun. 
I  had  scarcely  time  to  look  round,  and  the  dazzling 
whiteness  was  too  much  for  my  eyes,  even  when  pro- 
tected by  blue  glass;  but  Moorcroft  says  that  when  he 
crossed  it,  and  when  there  must  have  been  much  less 
snow,  "The  view  from  the  crest  presented  a  majestic 
line  of  snow-covered  mountain-tops,  very  little  above  the 
level  of  the  pass,  extending  round  a  circle  of  at  least 
twenty  miles  in  diameter.  The  uniformity  of  the  ridges 
was  very  remarkable ;  for  although  broken  with  peak 
and  gorge,  yet  there  were  no  single  mountains  or  moun- 
tain-chains that  towered  ambitiously  above  their  fel- 
lows." 

It  took  us  a  long  time  to  get  down  that  snow-slope, 
and  for  riders  it  was  rather  ticklish  work.  On  reaching 
the  desolate  valley,  where  there  were  only  a  (ew  stunted 
bushes,  I  thought  it  high  time  to  refresh  the  inner  man, 
fancying  we  had  only  to  go  down  this  valley  a  little  way 
to  come  upon  Dras  and  human  habitations  ;  but  I  had 
only  taken  a  few  mouthfuls  when  I  learned  that  it  led 
nowhere,  that  it  had  no  human  habitations,  and  that,  in 


282  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


order  to  reach  Dras,  we  should  have  to  cross  another 
snowy  range,  possibly  higher  than  the  one  we  had  just 
got  over  with  so  much  difficulty.  The  effect  upon  me  of 
this  piece  of  information  was  precisely  like  that  of  a  hot 
potato.  On  inquiry,  I  found  that  the  score  of  coolies 
had  little  more  than  a  pound  of  flour  among  them,  and 
that  my  servants  were  in  almost  as  bad  a  predicament. 
I  had  told  the  latter  always  to  be  provided  for  such  an 
emergency  ;  but  they  excused  themselves  on  the  ground 
that  they  had  supposed  we  had  got  out  of  the  high 
mountains.  I  myself  could  have  camped  with  perfect 
comfort,  having  plenty  of  provisions  and  clothing;  but 
the  bigarries  had  no  sufficient  means  of  protecting  them- 
selves from  the  cold,  besides  being  destitute  of  provi- 
sions. The  situation  was  an  extremely  difficult  one, 
because  by  this  time  it  was  past  three  o'clock  ;  the  sun 
was  completely  shaded  off  the  valley  by  the  mountains 
around;  an  intense  cold  began  to  make  us  all  shiver; 
and  to  attempt  a  snowy  pass  at  that  hour  in  the  after- 
noon, after  having  been  almost  continuously  travelling 
from  before  seven  in  the  morning,  was  a  distasteful  and 
exceedingly  hazardous  thing  to  do. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  occurred  to  me  very  forcibly 
that  if  I  did  camp  there  I  should  find  in  the  morning 
that  all  the  coolies  had  disappeared.  It  could  hardly 
be  supposed  that  they  had  led  me  into  this  position 
merely  for  the  pleasure  of  doing  three  days'  journey  in 
one,  or  of  themselves  spending  a  night,  unprotected  from 
the  cold  and  with  empty  stomachs,  in  the  Twajeh  val- 
ley. The  most  rational  supposition  was  that  they  wanted 
to  give  me  the  slip,  and  so  I  determined  to  proceed  at 
all  risks.  It  was  most  fortunate  I  did  so,  because  next 
day  a  tremendous  snowstorm  fell  over  these  mountains. 
If  we  had  remained  in  this  elevated  valley  all  night,  we 
certainly  could  not  have  got  over  to  Dras  the  next  day, 


KASHMIR.  283 


or  for  several  days,  and  it  is  almost  as  certain  that  we 
could  not  have  got  back  to  Omba.  The  most  of  the 
party  must  have  perished  ;  and  hence  I  really  was 
indebted  to  the  imaginary  Dras-wallah,  though  from 
the  exposure  of  that  evening  I  suffered  for  months. 

But  having  determined  to  proceed,  it  was  absolutely 
necessary  to  secure  that  the  bearers  of  my  baggage 
should  do  so  likewise.  Fortunately  all  my  servants 
were  mounted,  so  I  broke  up  our  party  into  three  divi- 
sions, in  order  that  the  coolies  might  more  easily  be  kept 
in  hand.  I  sent  on  my  most  valuable  articles  in  front, 
carried  by  coolies  under  charge  of  the  violent  Chota 
Khan,  and  a  sowar,  or  trooper,  who  had  been  sent  with 
me  by  the  Thanadar  of  Surd.  Keeping  the  sharp  boy 
Nurdass  with  me,  I  took  the  most  refractory  of  the  men 
under  my  own  charge,  and  made  Phooleyram  and  Silas 
with  his  gun  look  after  a  small  section  in  the  rear.  My 
servants  saw  as  well  as  I  did  the  necessity  for  the  most 
decided  action,  and  we  soon  reached  the  foot  of  the 
second  range.  Here  the  man  who  had  before  nearly 
succeeded  in  running  away  gave  me  some  trouble  by 
making  a  similar  attempt,  and  afterwards  by  lying 
down  and  refusing  t©  budge  an  inch  farther ;  so  I  had  to 
show  him  that  such  conduct  might  involve  worse  evils 
than  those  of  going  on.  I  was  not  at  all  afraid  of  their 
running  away  once  I  got  them  well  over  the  summit  of 
this  infernal  second  snowy  range,  because  from  that 
point  they  could  hardly  have  reached  Omba  on  empty 
stomachs  ;  so  my  great  anxiety  was  to  get  them  over 
the  brow  of  the  range  before  dark,  so  long  as  there  was 
light  enough  for  us  to  keep  them  in  hand.  By  various 
kinds  of  encouragement  I  managed  to  push  them  up 
that  lofty  mountain  at  really  an  astonishing  rate,  con- 
sidering the  ground  they  had  got  over  that  day ;  and 
when  I  saw  men  flagging  really  from  want  of  strength, 


284  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


I  made  them  hold  on  by  our  horses'  tails,  which,  lit 
making  an  ascent,  is  very  nearly  as  good  as  riding  on 
the  animal  itself. 

The  sun  had  disappeared,  and  the  light  on  the  snow 
we  were  crossing  had  become  pale,  when  I  got  my  party 
up  to  the  summit  of  this  great  mountain-ridge.  But 
instead  of  a  descent  to  Dras,  I  saw  before  me,  with 
dismay,  a  large  valley  of  snow,  athwart  which  ran  the 
tracks  of  Chota  Khan's  party,  rising  up  into  a  higher 
mountain-range  beyond.  It  was  in  fact  a  sort  of  double 
pass  we  were  on  ;  and  though  the  descent  between  the 
two  ridges  was  not  great,  yet  it  was  sufficiently  formi- 
dable, and  the  distance  between  them  was  enough  to 
alarm  one  in  the  circumstances.  How  weird  that  scene 
was  in  the  grey  fading  light !  The  cold  made  me  shiver 
to  the  bone;  but  there -was  something  in  the  scene 
also  to  make  one  shiver,  so  cold-looking  was  it,  so 
death-like.  A  crescent  moon  gleamed  in  the  sky  with 
exceeding  brightness,  and  the  whole  disc  of  the  moon 
was  distinctly  visible,  but  its  light  was  insufficient  to 
dispel  the  darkness  which  seemed  to  be  creeping  up 
from  the  valley  over  the  wastes  of  snow.  We  had 
quite  sufficient  light,  however,  to  take  us  over  the 
second  summit  of  the  pass,  but  I  suffered  much  from 
the  cold,  being  insufficiently  clad,  having  had  no  ex- 
pectation whatever  of  being  up  about  16,000  feet  at 
such  an  hour.  It  was  with  a  feeling  of  great  relief  that 
I  learned  that  we  had  now  only  to  descend,  and  had  no 
more  snowy  ridges  to  surmount  on  our  terrible  way 
to  Dras. 

But  how  to  descend  ?  That  was  the  question  which 
immediately  forced  itself  upon  me.-  I  was  inclined  to 
stick  to  the  pony  so  long  as  I  did  not  find  it  upon 
the  top  of  me ;  and  fortunately  it  was  a  wonderful 
steed,  equalled  only  by  that  of  the  Shigri  valley.    But 


KASHMIR.  285 


by  this  time  the  night  had  become  dark,  the  crescent 
moon  was  disappearing  behind  the  mountains,  and 
there  were  long  slopes  of  snow  to  be  traversed.  Here 
the  pony  absolutely  refused  to  move  a  step  without  my 
allowing  it  to  put  its  nose  down  close  to  the  snow ;  and 
though,  when  it  was  in  such  an  attitude  on  a  steep 
slope,  there  was  considerable  difficulty  in  keeping  on 
its  back,  I  found  it  could  be  trusted  to  go  down  safely 
in  that  way  ;  and  carry  me  down  it  did,  until  we  got 
into  a  deep  and  excessively  dark  gorge,  where  it  was 
impossible  to  ride.  It  was  so  dark  here  that  we  could 
hardly  see  a  step  before  us,  and  I  scrambled  through  in 
a  manner  that  I  could  hardly  have  believed  possible. 
Our  way  lay  along  the  bed  of  a  stream  full  of  great 
stones,  over  which  we  often  fell.  Then  we  would  break 
through  ice  into  pools  of  ice-cold  water,  and  come 
to  falls  where  we  had  to  let  one  man  down  and  descend 
upon  his  shoulders.  The  pony  meanwhile  followed  us, 
obedient  to  the  voice  of  its  owner;  and  it  seemed  to 
have  more  power  of  finding  its  way  than  we  possessed, 
for  it  got  round  descents  which  it  could  hardly  have 
jumped,  and  which  we  could  find  no  way  of  avoiding. 

After  that  frightful  passage  we  came  on  more  gentle 
and  easy  descents,  but  it  was  with  intense  relief  that  I 
saw  the  flames  of  a  large  fire  of  thorn-bushes  which 
Chota  Khan  and  the  sowar  had  kindled  for  our  guid- 
ance at  a  hamlet  opposite  to  Dras,  on  our  side  of  the 
river.  We  gladly  turned  our  steps  in  that  direction, 
and  stayed  there  for  the  night,  the  men  of  the  hamlet 
assisting  in  setting  up  my  tent.  It  was  past  ten  before 
I  reached  this  place,  so  that  we  had  been  above  fifteen 
hours  almost  continuously  travelling.  The  party  under 
Silas  came  in  soon,  but  he  himself  did  not  turn  up  for 
nearly  an  hour,  and  when  he  arrived  he  was  in  a  very 
excited   state.     After  dark  he   got  separated    from  his 


286  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

party,  and  came  down  that  awful  gorge  in  company 
with  one  old  coolie,  of  whose  language  he  understood 
only  the  single  word  bah't,  or  "bear;"  and  no  doubt 
there  were  likely  enough  to  be  bears  about.  This 
was  clearly  not  treatment  such  as  a  Bombay  butler 
had  a  right  to  expect ;  but  a  little  cocoa  had  a  bene- 
ficial effect  upon  him  ;  and  whenever  my  tent  was  set 
up  I  went  to  sleep  in  spite  of  the  wind,  which  now 
began  to  blow  violently,  accompanied  by  rain,  and 
was  so  worn  out  that  I  did  not  rise,  or  almost  awake, 
till  one  o'clock  next  day. 

The  morning  was  wet  and  windy  ;  thick  clouds 
covered  the  mountains  which  we  had  descended,  and  as 
they  lifted  occasionally  I  saw  that  heavy  snow  had 
fallen.  In  such  weather,  and  being  in  a  fatigued 
condition,  it  was  quite  sufficient  to  move  from  our 
exposed  camp  only  two  miles  to  the  Thana  of  Dras, 
where  there  was  the  shelter  of  trees  and  of  walls.  The 
Thanader  there  spoke  of  the  snow  being  forty  feet 
deep  in  winter,  though  the  height  is  little  over  io.COO 
feet,  and  he  seemed  a  highly  respectable  old  officer. 
His  quarters  are  detached  some  way  from  the  large 
fort  where  the  most  of  his  troops  are  stationed,  and 
I  suppose  these  latter  are  not  much  needed  now,  unless 
for  purposes  of  oppression.  Dras  is  a  dependency  of 
Kashmir,  being  one  of  the  provinces  which  have  been 
added  to  it  by  Mohammedan  force  and  Hindu  fraud, 
which  do  not  fail  in  the  long  run  to  break  the  shield 
of  the  mountaineers.  This  valley  is  sometimes  called 
Himbab,  or  the  "  Source  of  Snow,"  which  must  be 
a  very  suitable  name  for  it,  if  that  prodigious  story 
about  the  forty  feet  of  snow  be  true. 

There  remains,  however,  another  pass  to  be  crossed 
before  we  get  into  the  valleys  of  even  Upper  Kashmir. 
A   very    cold    and    wet    day's    journey    took    us    up 


KASHMIR.  287 


the  Dras  river  to  the  miserable  hamlet  of  Mataan, 
where,  before  getting  out  of  my  tent  next  morning, 
I  learned  that  the  Yarkund  envoy  could  not  be  far 
off.  I  heard  a  loud  voice  crying  out,  Caff<f,  banao, 
cJia  banao — "  Make  coffee,  make  tea," — followed  by 
whack,  whack,  as  the  blows  of  a  stick  descended 
upon  a  man's  back.  This  turned  out  to  be  the  Wuzeer's 
Wuzeer,  or  the  envoy's  avant-courier,  who  was  pushing 
on  ahead  of  his  patron,  and  preparing  the  way.  Like 
many  gentlemen's  gentlemen,  he  was  extremely  indig- 
nant at  the  comforts  of  life  not  being  ready  for  him.  I 
do  not  believe  that  this  miserable  hamlet  of  Mataan 
could  have  turned  out  a  cup  of  tea  or  coffee  to  save  the 
lives  of  all  its  inhabitants  ;  and  it  seemed  to  me  that 
the  Wuzeer's  Wuzeer  administered  the  stick  to  the  entire 
population  of  that  unhappy  village.  When  I  came  out 
of  my  tent,  I  had  a  momentary  glimpse  of  a  little  man 
in  something  like  a  red  dressing-gown,  dancing  furiously 
round  a  very  big  man,  and  hitting  him  with  a  long  stick  ; 
but,  on  my  appearance,  he  suddenly  retired  into  his  duli. 
After  that,  on  the  six  marches  down  to  Srinagar,  I  never 
found  myself  clear  of  the  retinue  of  the  Yarkund  envoy  : 
for  the  whole  road  down  was  covered  with  men  carrying 
his  things;  and  tents,  guarded  by  Kashmir  soldiers,  had 
been  pitched  for  him  at  various  places.  There  were  said 
to  be  3000  coolies  employed  in  carrying  up  himself  and 
the  effects  he  had  purchased  in  Europe.  I  cannot  say 
as  to  the  exact  number;  but  really  there  seemed  to  be 
no  end  of  them,  and  they  came  from  all  parts  of  Kash- 
mir. They  were  to  be  met  with  at  almost  every  turn- 
ing, and  in  very  various  positions.  At  one  moment  I 
would  find  half-a-dozen  of  them  resting  to  groan  under 
the  weight  of  a  24-pounder  gun,  wrapped  in  straw,  while 
a  sepoy  of  the  Kashmir  Maharajah  threatened  them 
with  his  stick,  or  even  with  his  sword  ;  half-an-hour  after 


THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


another  party  of  them  were  pulling  down  walnuts  from 
some  grand  old  tree,  while  some  grand-looking  old  dame 
(for  the  Kashmir  women  who  survive  to  old  age  have  an 
aristocratic  appearance,  which  would  attract  attention 
in  the  courts  of  Europe)  was  looking  on  the  spoliation 
of  her  property,  or  on  that  of  her  grandchild,  now  with 
a  melancholy  dignity,  which  might  have  become  the 
tragic  muse,  and  anon  with  shrieks  and  imprecations 
which  might  have  excited  the  envy  of  a  mcenad.  Again, 
I  would  come  across  three  or  four  hundred  of  them  at 
sundown,  kneeling  down  at  prayer,  with  their  faces 
turned  towards  what  was  supposed  to  be  the  direction 
of  Mecca,  but  which  really  was  more  in  the  direction  of 
the  North  Pole  Star  than  of  anything  else.  At  another 
time  a  party  of  them  would  halt  as  I  came  by,  support 
their  burdens  on  the  short  poles  which  they  carried  for 
that  purpose,  and  some  Hindusthani  spokesman  among 
them  would  say  to  me,  "  O  Protector  of  the  Poor!" 
(Gurib  Parwdr,  pronounced  Gurif>ur),  "  you  have  been 
up  among  these  snowy  mountains — shall  we  ever  see 
our  house-roofs  again?"  They  all  had  the  same  story 
as  to  their  monetary  position.  Each  man  had  got  five 
rupees  (I  do  not  know  whether  small  chi/ki,  Kashmir 
rupees,  or  British,  but  should  fancy  the  former)  in  order 
to  purchase  rice  for  the  journey  ;  but  their  further  ex- 
pectations on  the  subject  of  pay  were  of  the  most  de- 
sponding kind,  and  the  only  anxiety  they  showed  was, 
not  as  to  how  they  were  to  get  back  again,  but  as  to 
whether  it  would  be  at  all  possible  for  them  ever  to  get 
back  again.  I  must  have  missed  the  Yarkund  envoy 
himself  about  Ganderbahl,  a  day's  march  from  Srina- 
gar ;  but  shortly  before  getting  to  Ganderbahl  I  came 
across  three  of  his  retinue,  who  puzzled  me  a  little.  It 
was  very  wet  and  very  muddy,  when  I  suddenly  came 
across  three  riders  in  black  European  waterproofs,  one 


KASHMIR. 


of  whom  said  to  me  —  "Bones  sore,  Mushu  !  "  After 
being  for  months  up  in  the  Himaliya,  one  is  unaccustomed 
to  being  accosted  in  a  European  language ;  and  the 
matter  was  complicated  by  the  fact  that  my  bones  were 
sore  at  the  time,  and  most  confoundedly  so,  from  the 
combined  effect  of  that  evening  on  the  Omba-la  and  of 
a  fall.  Hence  it  was  that  I  had  fairly  passed  the  three 
curious  riders  before  it  at  all  occurred  to  my  mind  that  the 
salutation  was  "  Bon  soir,  Monsieur."  They  were  doubt- 
less Frenchified  Turks,  whom  the  envoy  had  brought 
from  Constantinople  ;  but  they  had  scarcely  any  ground 
to  expect  that  their  peculiar  French  would  be  recog- 
nised, on  the  moment,  in  one  of  the  upper  valleys  of 
Kashmir. 

But  I  have  not  yet  got  into  even  the  outskirts  of  the 
Garden  of  Eden.  The  Zoji-la  had  to  be  crossed  ;  and 
though  it  is  a  very  easy  pass,  and  set  down  by  the  Tri- 
gonometrical Survey  as  only  1 1,300  feet  high,  yet  I  have 
heard,  and  suspect,  that  a  mistake  has  been  made  there, 
and  that  nearly  a  thousand  feet  might  have  been  added 
to  it.  Let  Major  Montgomerie's  map  be  compared  with 
the  sheets  of  the  Trigonometrical  Survey,  on  which  it 
must  be  supposed  to  be  based,  and  discrepancies  will  be 
found.  The  Trigonometrical  Survey  has  achieved  more 
than  would  allow  of  absolute  accuracy  in  all  its  details ; 
but,  considering  the  means  at  its  command,  it  has  done 
wonders.  Still,  though  the  Zoji  Pass  may  be  higher 
than  it  has  been  set  down,  yet  it  seems  almost  child's- 
play  to  the  traveller  from  Zanskar  and  the  Omba-la. 
Though  it  seemed  to  me  nothing  after  what  I  had  gone 
through,  yet  this  pass  must  have  a  formidable  appear- 
ance to  travellers  coming  upon  it  from  below,  judging 
from  the  following  description  of  it  by  Dr  Henderson, 
the  ornithologist  of  the  first  of  Sir  Thomas  Forsyth's 
missions  to  Yarkund  :  — 

T 


290  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

"  The  road  we  had  ascended  was  in  many  places  rather  trying  to  the 
nerves,  being  very  steep,  and  sometimes  consisting  merely  of  a  platform  of 
brushwood  attached  to  the  face  of  the  precipice.  This  road,  owing  to  its 
steepness,  is  quite  impassable  for  baggage  animals  after  a  fall  of  snow,  and 
it  is  then  necessary  to  wait  at  Baltal  until  tlve  snow  has  melted,  or  to  follow 
the  stream  up  a  very  narrow  rocky  gorge,  with  precipices  of  from  500  to 
1000  feet  on  either  side.  This  gorge,  however,  is  only  practicable  when  filled 
up  by  snow  to  about  fifty  feet  in  depth,  as  it  usually  is  early  in  the  season : 
it  is  then  the  usual  route  ;  and  at  that  season,  in  order  to  avoid  the  avalan- 
ches, it  is  necessary  to  start  at  night  and  get  over  the  pass  before  sunrise. 
Avalanches  do  not  fall  until  late  in  the  day,  after  the  sun  begins  to  melt 
the  snow." — Lahore  to  Yarkund :   London,  1873. 

I  do  not  think  the  road  has  been  improved  since  Dr 
Henderson  passed  over  it ;  and  now  that  I  think  of  it,  I 
remember  that  there  was  something  like  the  brushwood 
platforms  of  which  he  speaks.  The  great  interest  of  it  is 
that  it  leads  suddenly  down  upon  the  beautiful  wooded 
scenery  of  Kashmir.  After  months  of  the  sterile,  almost 
treeless  Tibetan  provinces,  the  contrast  was  very  strik- 
ing, and  I  could  not  but  revel  in  the  beauty  and  glory 
of  the  vegetation  ;  but  even  to  one  who  had  come  upon 
it  from  below  the  scene  would  have  been  very  strik- 
ing. There  was  a  large  and  lively  encampment  at  the 
foot  of  the  pass,  with  tents  prepared  for  the  Yarkund 
envoy,  and  a  number  of  Kashmir  officers  and  soldiers; 
but  I  pushed  on  beyond  that,  and  camped  in  solitude 
close  to  the  Sind  river,  just  beneath  the  Panjtarne 
valley,  which  leads  up  towards  the  caves  of  Amber- 
neth,  a  celebrated  place  for  Hindu  pilgrimage.  This 
place  is  called  Baltal,  but  it  has  no  human  habita- 
tions. Smooth  green  meadows,  carpet-like  and  em- 
broidered with  flowers,  extended  to  the  silvery  stream, 
above  which  there  was  the  most  varied  luxuriance  of 
foliage,  the  lower  mountains  being  most  richly  clothed 
with  woods  of  many  and  beautiful  colours.  It  was  late 
autumn,  and  the  trees  were  in  their  greatest  variety  of 
colour  ;  but  hardly  a  leaf  seemed  to,  have  fallen.  The 
dark  green  of  the  pines  contrasted  beautifully  with  the 


KASHMIR.  291 


delicate  orange  of  the  birches,  because  there  were  inter- 
mingling tints  of  brown  and  saffron.  Great  masses  of 
foliage  were  succeeded  by  solitary  pines,  which  had 
found  a  footing  high  up  the  precipitous  crags. 

And  all  this  was  combined  with  peaks  and  slopes  of 
pure  white  snow.  Aiguilles  of  dark  rock  rose  out  of 
beds  of  snow,  but  their  faces  were  powdered  with  the 
same  element.  Glaciers  and  long  beds  of  snow  ran 
down  the  valleys,  and  the  upper  vegetation  had  snow 
for  its  bed.  The  effect  of  sunset  upon  this  scene  was 
wonderful ;  for  the  colours  it  displayed  were  both 
heightened  and  more  harmoniously  blended.  The 
golden  light  of  eve  brought  out  the  warm  tints  of 
the  forest ;  but  the  glow  of  the  reddish-brown  pre- 
cipices, and  the  rosy  light  upon  the  snowy  slopes 
and  peaks,  were  too  soon  succeeded  by  the  cold  grey 
of  evening.  At  first,  however,  the  wondrous  scene  was 
still  visible  in  a  quarter-moon's  silvery  light,  in  which 
the  Panjtarne  valley  was  in  truth — ■ 

"  A  wild  romantic  chasm,  that  slanted 
Down  the  sweet  hill  athwart  a  cedar  cover— 
A  savage  place,  as  holy  and  enchanted 
As  e'er  beneath  the  waning  moon  was  haunted 
By  woman  wailing  for  her  demon-lover." 

The  demon-lovers  to  be  met  with  in  that  wild  valley  are, 
bears,  which  are  in  abundance ;  and  a  more  delightful 
place  for  a  hunter  to  spend  a  month  in  could  hardly  be 
invented  ;  but  he  would  have  to  depend  on  his  rifle  for 
supplies,  or  have  them  sent  up  from  many  miles  down 
the  Sind  valley. 

The  remainder  of  my  journey  down  this  latter  valley 
to  the  great  valley  or  small  plain  of  Kashmir  was  de- 
lightful. A  good  deal  of  rain  fell,  but  that  made  one 
appreciate  the  great  trees  all  the  more,  for  the  rain  was 
not  continuous,   and  was   mingled  with  sunshine.     At 


292  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

times,  during  the  season  when  I  saw  it,  this  "inland 
depth  "  is  "  roaring  like  the  sea ; " 

"  While  trees,  dim-seen,  in  frenzied  numbers  tear 
The  lingering  remnant  of  their  yellow  hair  ;" 

but  soon  after  it  is  bathed  in  perfect  peace  and  mellow 
sunlight.  The  air  was  soft  and  balmy;  but,  at  this 
transfer  from  September  to  October,  it  was  agreeably- 
cool  even  to  a  traveller  from  the  abodes  and  sources  of 
snow.  As  we  descended,  the  pine-forests  were  confined 
to  the  mountain-slopes;  but  the  lofty  deodar  began  to 
appear  in  the  valley,  as  afterwards  the  sycamore,  the 
elm,  and  the  horse-chestnut.  Round  the  picturesque 
villages,  and  even  forming  considerable  woods,  there 
were  fruit-trees — as  the  walnut,  the  chestnut,  the  peach, 
the  apricot,  the  apple,  and  the  pear.  Large  quantities 
of  timber  (said  to  be  cut  recklessly)  was  in  course  of 
being  floated  down  the  river ;  and  where  the  path  led 
across  it,  there  were  curious  wooden  bridges,  for  which  it 
was  not  necessary  to  dismount.  This  Sind  valley  is 
about  sixty  miles  long,  and  varies  in  breadth  from  a  few 
hundred  yards  to  about  a  mile,  except  at  its  base,  where 
it  opens  out  considerably.  It  is  considered  to  afford 
the  best  idea  of  the  mingled  beauty  and  grandeur  of 
♦Kashmir  scenery  ;  and  when  I  passed  through,  its 
appearance  was  greatly  enhanced  by  the  snow,  which 
not  only  covered  the  mountain  tops,  but  also  came 
down  into  the  forests  which  clothed  the  mountain- 
sides. The  path  through  it,  being  part  of  the  great 
road  from  Kashmir  to  Central  Asia,  is  kept  in  tolerable 
repair,  and  it  is  very  rarely  that  the  rider  requires  to 
dismount.  Anything  beyond  a  walking  pace,  however, 
is  for  the  most  part  out  of  the  question.  Montgomerie 
divides  the  journey  from  Srinagar  to  Baltal  (where  I 
camped  below  the  Zoji-la)  into  six  marches,  making  in 


KASHMIR.  293 


all  sixty-seven  miles  ;  and  though  two  of  these  marches 
may  be  done  in  one  day,  yet  if  you  are  to  travel  easily 
and  enjoy  the  scenery,  one  a  day  is  sufficient.  The 
easiest  double  march  is  from  Sonamarg  to  Gond,  and  I 
did  it  in  a  day  with  apparent  ease  on  a  very  poor  pony; 
but  the  consequence  is  that  I  beat  my  brains  in  vain  in 
order  to  recall  what  sort  of  place  Gond  was,  no  distinct 
recollection  of  it  having  been  left  on  my  mind  except  of 
a  grove  of  large  trees  and  a  roaring  fire  in  front  of  my 
tent  at  night.  Sonamarg  struck  me  as  a  very  pleasant 
place  ;  and  I  had  there,  in  the  person  of  a  youthful 
captain  from  Abbotabad,  the  pleasure  of  meeting  the 
first  European  I  had  seen  since  leaving  Lahaul.  We 
dined  together,  and  I  found  he  had  come  up  from 
Srinagar  to  see  Sonamarg,  and  he  spoke  with  great 
enthusiasm  of  a  view  he  had  had,  from  another  part  of 
Kashmir,  of  the  26,000-feet  mountain  Nanga  Parbat. 
Marg  means  a  "  meadow,"  and  seems  to  be  applied 
specially  to  elevated  meadows  ;  sona  stands  for 
"golden:"  and  this  place  is  a  favourite  resort,  in. 
the  hot  malarious  months  of  July  and  August,  both 
for  the  Europeans  in  Kashmir,  and  for  natives  of 
rank.  The  village,  being  composed  of  four  houses  and 
three  outlying  ones,  cannot  produce  much  in  the  way 
of  either  coolies  or  supplies.  Its  commercial  ideas 
may  be  gathered  from  the  fact  that  I  was  here  asked 
seven  rupees  for  a  pound  of  tea  which  was  nothing  but 
the  refuse  of  tea-chests  mixed  with  all  sorts  of  dirt.  In 
the  matter  of  coolies  I  was  independent,  for  the  bigarrics 
who  had  taken  my  effects  over  the  Zoji-la  were  so 
afraid  of  being  impressed  for  the  service  of  the  Yarkund 
envoy,  that  they  had  entreated  me  to  engage  them  as 
far  as  Ganderbahl,  near  the  capital,  hoping  that  by  the 
time  they  reached  that  place  the  fierce  demand  for 
coolies  might  have  ceased. 


294  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

At  Ganderbahl  I  was  fairly  in  the  great  valley  of 
Kashmir,  and  encamped  under  some  enormous  chundr 
or  sycamore  trees  ;  the  girth  of  one  was  so  great  that 
its  trunk  kept  my  little  mountain-tent  quite  sheltered 
from  the  furious  blasts.     Truly — 

"  There  was  a  roaring  in  the  wind  all  night, 
The  rain  fell  heavily,  and  fell  in  floods  ; " 

but  that  gigantic  chiindr  kept  off  both  wind  and  rain 
wonderfully.  Next  day  a  small  but  convenient  and 
quaint  Kashmir  boat  took  me  up  to  Srinagar  ;  and  it 
was  delightful  to  glide  up  the  backwaters  of  the  Jhelam, 
which  afforded  a  highway  to  the  capital.  It  was  the 
commencement  and  the  promise  of  repose,  which  I  very 
seriously  needed,  and  in  a  beautiful  land. 

As  Srinagar,  where  I  stayed  for  a  fortnight,  I  was  the 
guest  of  the  Resident,  the  amiable  and  accomplished 
Mr  Le  Poer  Wynne,  whose  early  death  has  disappointed 
many  bright  hopes.  I  had  thus  every  opportunity  of 
seeing  all  that  could  be  seen  about  the  capital,  and  of 
making  myself  acquainted  with  the  state  of  affairs  in 
Kashmir.  I  afterwards  went  up  to  Islamabad,  Martand, 
Achibal,  Vernag,  the  Rozlu  valley,  and  finally  went  out 
of  Kashmir  by  way  of  the  Manas  and  Wular  lakes,  and 
the  lower  valley  of  the  Jhelam,  so  that  I  saw  the  most 
interesting  places  in  the  country,  and  all  the  varieties 
of  scenery  which  it  affords.  That  country  has  been  so 
often  visited  and  described,  that,  with  one  or  two 
exceptions,  I  shall  only  touch  generally  upon  its 
characteristics.  It  doubtless  owes  some  of  its  charm  to 
the  character  of  the  regions  in  its  neighbourhood.  As 
compared  with  the  burning  plains  of  India,  the  sterile 
steppes  of  Tibet,  and  the  savage  mountains  of  the  Ilim- 
aliya  and  of  Afghanistan,  it  presents  an  astonishing 
and  beautiful  contrast.     After  such  scenes  even  a  much 


KASHMIR.  295 


more  commonplace  country  might  have  afforded  a  good 
deal  of  the  enthusiasm  which  Kashmir  has  excited  in 
Eastern  poetry,  and  even  in  common  rumour  ;  but  be- 
yond that  it  has  characteristics  which  give  it  a  distinct 
place  among  the  most  pleasing  regions  of  the  earth.  I 
said  to  the  Maharajah,  or  ruling  Prince  of  Kashmir,  that 
the  most  beautiful  countries  I  had  seen  were  England, 
Italy,  Japan,  and  Kashmir;  and  though  he  did  not 
seem  to  like  the  remark  much,  probably  from  a  fear  that 
the  beauty  of  the  land  he  governed  might  make  it  too 
much  an  object  of  desire,  yet  there  was  no  exaggeration 
in  it.  Here,  at  a  height  of  nearly  6000  feet,  in  a  tem- 
perate climate,  with  abundance  of  moisture,  and  yet 
protected  by  lofty  mountains  from  the  fierce  continuous 
rains  of  the  Indian  south-west  monsoon,  we  have  the 
most  splendid  amphitheatre  in  the  world.  A  flat  oval 
valley  about  sixty  miles  long,  and  from  forty  in  breadth, 
is  surrounded  by  magnificent  mountains,  which,  during 
the  greater  part  of  the  year,  are  covered  more  than  half- 
way down  with  snow,  and  present  vast  upland  beds  01 
pure  white  snow.  This  valley  has  fine  lakes,  is  inter- 
sected with  watercourses,  and  its  land  is  covered  with 
brilliant  vegetation,  including  gigantic  trees  of  the  richest 
foliage.  And  out  of  this  great  central  valley  there  rise 
innumerable,  long,  picturesque  mountain-valleys,  such 
as  that  of  the  Sind  river,  which  I  have  just  described  ; 
while  above  these  there  are  great  pine-forests,  green 
slopes  of  grass,  glaciers-,  and  snow.  Nothing  could 
express  the  general  effect  better  than  Moore's  famous 
lines  on  sainted  Lebanon — 

"  Whose  head  in  wintry  grandeur  towers^ 

And  whitens  with  eternal  sleet ; 
While  Summer,  in  a  vale  of  flowers, 
Is  sleeping  rosy  at  his  feet." 

The  great  encircling  walls  of  rock  and  snow  contrast 


296  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

grandly  with  the  soft  beauty  of  the  scene  beneath.  The 
snows  have  a  wonderful  effect  as  we  look  up  to  them 
through  the  leafy  branches  of  the  immense  diimdr,  elm, 
and  poplar  trees.  They  flash  gloriously  in  the  morning 
sunlight  above  the  pink  mist  of  the  valley-plain  ;  they 
have  a  rosy  glow  in  the  evening  sunlight ;  and  when 
the  sunlight  has  departed,  but  ere  darkness  shrouds 
them,  they  gleam  afar  off,  with  a  cold  and  spectral  light, 
as  if  they  belonged  to  a  region  where  man  had  never 
trod.  The  deep  black  gorges  in  the  mountains  have  a 
mysterious  look.  The  sun  lights  up  some  softer  grassy 
ravine  or  green  slope,  and  then  displays  splintered  rocks 
rising  in  the  wildest  confusion.  Often  long  lines  of 
white  clouds  lie  along  the  line  of  mountain-summits, 
while  at  other  times  every  white  peak  and  precipice- 
wall  is  distinctly  marked  against  the  deep-blue  sky. 
The  valley-plain  is  especially  striking  in  clear  mornings 
and  evenings,  when  it  lies  partly  in  golden  sunlight, 
partly  in  the  shadow  of  its  great  hills. 

The  green  mosaic  of  the  level  land  is  intersected  by 
many  streams,  canals,  and  lakes,  or  beautiful  reaches  of 
river  which  look  like  small  lakes.  The  lakes  have 
floating  islands  composed  of  vegetation.  Besides  the 
immense  chundrs  and  elms,  and  the  long  lines  of  stately 
poplars,  great  part  of  the  plain  is  a  garden  filled  with 
fruits  and  flowers,  and  there  is  almost  constant  verdure. 

"  There  eternal  summer  dwells, 
And  west  winds,  with  musky  wing, 
About  the  cedared  alleys  fling 
Nard  and  cassia's  balmy  smells." 

It  is  a  pity  that  so  beautiful  a  country  should  not 
have  a  finer  population.  At  the  entrances  of  the  valleys, 
looking  at  the  forests,  the  rich  uncultivated  lands,  and 
the  unused  water-power,  I  could  not  but  think  of  the 
scenes  in  England — 


KASHMIR.  297 


'  Where  lawns  extend  that  scorn  Arcadian  pride, 
And  brighter  streams  than  famed  Ilydaspes*  glide." 

My  mind  reverted  also  to  the  flashing  snows  of  the 
American  Sierra  Nevada,  the  dwarf  oaks  and  rich 
fields  of  wheat,  the  chubby  children,  the  comely,  well- 
dressed  women,  and  the  strong  stalwart  men  of  Cali- 
fornia. For  though  the  chalets  were  picturesque  enough 
at  a  little  distance,  they  could  not  bear  a  close  examina- 
tion ;  and  there  was  not  much  satisfaction  to  be  had  in 
contemplating  the  half-starved,  half-naked  children,  and 
the  thin,  worn-out-looking  women.  One  could  not  help 
thinking  of  the  comfortable  homes  which  an  Ancdo- 
Saxon  population  would  rear  in  such  a  land. 

The  beauty  of  the  Kashmir  women  has  long  been 
famous  in  the  East,  but  if  you  want  beautiful  Kashmiris, 
do  not  go  to  Kashmir  to  look  for  them.  They  have  all 
fine  eyes,  and  "  the  eyes  of  Kashmir"  have  been  justly 
celebrated  in  Eastern  poetry  ;  but  that  is  almost  the  only 
feminine  attraction  to  be  found  in  the  country,  even 
among  the  dancing-girls  and  the  boat-girls.  As  to  the 
ordinary  women,  there  is  too  much  sad  truth  in  Victor 
Jacquemont's  outburst  against  them — "  Know  that  I 
have  never  seen  anywhere  such  hideous  witches  as  in 
Kashmir.  [He  had  not  been  in  Tibet !]  The  female  race 
is  remarkably  ugly.  I  speak  of  womei>  of  the  common 
ranks — those  one  sees  in  the  streets  and  fields — since 
those  of  a  more  elevated  station  pass  all  their  lives  shut 
up,  and  are  never  seen.  It  is  true  that  all  little  girls  who 
promise  to  turn  out  pretty  are  sold  at  eight  years  of  age, 
and  carried  off  into  the  Panjab  and  India."  I  am  afraid 
a  good  deal  of  that  traffic  still  goes  on,  notwithstanding 
the  law  which  forbids  women  and  mares  to  be  taken 
out  of  the  country  ;  and  as  it  has  gone  on  for  genera- 

*  The  Jhelam. 


293  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW, 

tions,  it  is  easily  explicable  how  the  women  of  Kashmir 
should  be  so  ugly.  A  continuous  process  of  eliminating 
the  pretty  girls,  and  leaving  the  ugly  ones  to  continue 
the  race,  must  lower  the  standard  of  beauty.  But  the 
want  of  good  condition  strikes  one  more  painfully  in 
Kashmir  than  the  want  of  beauty.  The  aquiline  noses, 
long  chins,  and  long  faces  of  the  women  of  Kashmir, 
would  allow  only  of  a  peculiar  and  rather  Jewish  style 
of  beauty  ;  but  even  that  is  not  brought  out  well  by  the 
state  of  their  physique ;  and  I  don't  suppose  the  most 
beautiful  woman  in  the  world  would  show  to  advan- 
tage if  she  were  imperfectly  washed,  and  dressed  in  the 
ordinary  feminine  attire  of  Kashmir — a  dirty,  whitish 
cotton  night-gown. 

It  is  unfortunate  for  the  reputation  of  Kashmir  that 
a  sudden  death,  not  entirely  free  from  suspicious  cir- 
cumstances, should  have  befallen  three  of  our  country- 
men who  had  distinguished  themselves  by  exposing  the 
abuses  existing  in  the  country  ;  and  it  is  at  least  remark- 
able that  suspicion  on  the  subject  should  have  been 
roused  by  the  Kashmiris  themselves — that  is  to  say,  by 
reports  generally  current  in  Srinagar.  I  allude  to  Lieu- 
tenant Thorpe,  Dr  Elmslie,  and  Mr  Hayward.  The  first 
of  these  gentlemen  had  published  a  pamphlet  entitled 
"Kashmir  Misgovernment ;"  and  in  November  1868, 
when  almost  all  visitors  except  himself  had  left  Kash- 
mir for  the  season,  he  expired  suddenly  at  Srinagar, 
after  having  walked  up  the  Takht-i-Suliman,  a  hill  which 
rises  close  to  the  city  to  the  height  of  a  thousand  feet. 
Naturally  the  supposition  was  that  he  had  been  poi- 
soned ;  but  Surgeon  Caley,  who  happened  to  be  on  his 
way  down  from  Ladak,  examined  the  body  shortly  after 
death,  and  reported  that  there  had  been  "  rupture  of  the 
heart."  Dr  Elmslie  was  a  devoted  medical  missionary, 
who  did  an  immense  deal  of  good  in  Kashmir,  and  had 


KASHMIR.  29.9 


published  a  valuable  vocabulary  of  the  Kashmiri  lan- 
guage ;  but  he  had  also  published  letters  complaining  of 
the  carelessness  of  the  Government  in  regard  to  a  visi- 
tation of  cholera  which  had  carried  off  large  numbers  of 
the  people,  and  pointing  out  that  sanitary  measures 
might  save  the  lives  of  thousands  every  year  from  small- 
pox and  other  diseases.  The  Srinagar  rumour  was  that 
his. servants  had  been  offered  so  much  to  poison  him 
within  the  Kashmir  territory,  and  so  much  more  if  they 
would  do  so  after  he  got  beyond.  Unfortunately  Dr 
Elmslie  also  died  rather  suddenly  shortly  after  he  had 
got  beyond  the  Kashmir  borders,  and,  it  seems,  also  of 
heart  disease.  Mr  Hay  ward  had  published  letters  in 
the  Indian  papers  complaining  of  the  conduct  of  the 
Kashmir  troops  in  Gilgit,  and  on  the  borders  of  Yassin, 
and  he  somewhat  injudiciously  returned  to  that  part  of 
the  world.  But  I  do  not  attach  any  importance  to  the 
gossip  of  Eastern  cities — or  of  any  cities,  for  that  matter  ; 
and  there  has  appeared  no  ground  to  suppose  that  his 
death  was  planned  by  Kashmir  officials,  but  what  befell 
him  was  very  sad.  He  was  on  his  way  to  the  Pamir 
Steppe,  and  somewhere  about  Yassin  was  in  the  terri- 
tory of  a  chief  who  camped  two  hundred  armed  men  in 
a  wood  near  his  tent.  The  next  day's  journey  would 
have  taken  Hayward  beyond  'this  chief's  border ;  and, 
suspecting  mischief,  he  sat  up  all  night  writing  with 
revolver  in  hand.  Unfortunately,  however,  in  the  grey 
of  the  morning,  he  lay  down  to  take  half  an  hour's  sleep 
before  starting;  and  the  chief  with  his  people  came 
down  on  him  then,  overpowered  him,  tied  his  hands  be- 
hind his  back  and  took  him  into  the  wood.  Here,  seeing 
preparations  made  for  putting  him  to  death,  the  unfor- 
tunate traveller  offered  a  ransom  for  his  life  ;  but  his 
captors  would  not  hear  of  it.  They  made  him  kneel 
down,   and,   while   he    was    offering  up   a   prayer,  they 


300  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

hacked  off  his  head  after  the  half-hacking  half-sawing 
way  they  have  of  killing  sheep  in  the  Himaliya.  How 
this  story  was  gathered  has  been  told  in  the  Journal 
of  the  Royal  Geographical  Society,  and  tolerably  correct 
accounts  of  such  incidents  get  abroad  in  even  the  wildest 
parts  of  the  East.  The  moral  of  it  is,  that  one  ought  to 
avoid  Yassin,  rather  than  that  it  is  dangerous  to  abuse 
the  Kashmir  Government;  but  it  is  no  wonder  that  the 
three  cases  just  mentioned  should  have  given  rise  to 
suspicions  when  we  consider  the  character  of  the  people, 
and  the  powerful  motives  which  the  native  officials  have 
in  preventing  any  outcry  being  raised  against  them. 

Many  hundred  years  ago  the  Chinese  traveller  Fa- 
Hain  spoke  of  the  people  of  Kashmir  as  being  of  a 
peculiarly  bad  character.  Ranji't  Singh  said  to  Sir 
Alexander  Burnes,  "  All  the  people  I  send  into  Kash- 
mir turn  out  rascals  (Jiaramzada)  ;  there  is  too  much 
pleasure  and  enjoyment  in  that  country."  Moorcroft 
described  them  as  "  selfish,  superstitious,  ignorant,  sup- 
ple, intriguing,  dishonest,  and  false."  A  more  recent 
traveller,  Dr  A.  L.  Adams,  the  naturalist,  says  of  them, 
"  Everywhere  in  Cashmere  you  see  the  inhabitants  indo- 
lent to  a  degree,  filthy  in  their  habits,  mean,  cowardly, 
shabby,  irresolute,  and  indifferent  to  all  ideas  of  reform  or 
progress."  Their  name  has  become  a  byword  through- 
out a  great  part  of  all  Asia.  Even  where  there  are  so 
many  deceitful  nations,  they  have  obtained  a  bad  pre- 
eminence. According  to  a  well-known  Persian  saying, 
"you  will  never  experience  anything  but  sorrow  and 
anxiety  from  the  Kashmiri."  .  When  these  people  got 
this  bad  name  is  lost  in  antiquity,  and  so  is  the  period 
when  they  first  passed  into  the  unfortunate  circumstances 
which  have  demoralised  them.  They  are,  however,  not 
unattractive,  being  an  intellectual  people,  and  charac- 
terised by  great  ingenuity  and  sprightliness.      I  cannot 


KASHMIR.  301 


deny  the  truth  of  the  accusations  brought  against  them, 
yet  I  could  not  but  pity  them  and  sympathise  with 
them.  I  think  also  that  they  have  the  elements  of  what, 
in  more  fortunate  circumstances,  might  be  a  very  fine 
character  ;  but  dwelling  in  a  fertile  and  beautiful  valley, 
surrounded  by  hardy  and  warlike  tribes,  they  have  for 
ages  been  subject  to  that  oppression  which  destroys 
national  hope  and  virtue.  Their  population  has  hardly 
been  large  enough  to  afford  effectual  resistance  to  the 
opposing  forces,  though,  unless  there  had  been  a  large 
element  of  weakness  in  their  character,  they  might  surely 
have  held  their  passes  ;  and,  at  the  same  time,  they  were 
too  many  in  numbers  to  retire,  for  a  time,  before  in- 
vaders, from  their  fertile  lands  into  their  mountain  fast- 
nesses. As  it  is,  they  are  abominably  used  and  they 
use  each  other  abominably.  It  seemed  to  me  that  every 
common  soldier  of  the  Maharajah  of  Kashmir  felt  himself 
entitled  to  beat  and  plunder  the  country  people  ;  but  I 
noticed  that  my  boatmen  tried  to  do  the  same  whea 
they  thought  they  were  unobserved  by  me.  The  Maha- 
rajah himself  holds  an  open  court  on  one  day  every  week, 
at  which  the  meanest  peasant  is  nominally  free  to  make 
his  complaint,  even  if  it  be  against  the  highest  officials; 
but  I  was  told,  by  very  good  authority,  that  this  source 
of  redress  was  practically  inoperative,  not  because  the 
Maharajah  was  unwilling  to  do  justice,  but  because  there 
was  such  a  system  of  terrorism  that  the  common  people 
dared  not  come  forward  to  complain.  Great  improve- 
ments have  already  been  made  under  the  present  ruler 
of  Kashmir;  but  he  is  one  man  among  many,  and  when 
a  corrupt  and  oppressive  officialdom  has  existed  in  a 
country  for  ages,  it  cannot  be  rooted  out  in  one  reign. 

Our  position  in  Kashmir  is  a  very  curious  one,  and 
reflects  little  credit  upon  the  British  name.  By  the 
Treaty  of  Amritsar,  concluded  in   1846  after  the  first 


302  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Panjab  war,  we  actually  sold  the  country  to  Golab 
Singh,  the  father  hi  the  present  Maharajah,  for  seventy- 
five  lacs  of  rupees,  or  rather  less  than  three-quarters 
of  a  million  sterling ;  but  so  little  welcome  was  he, 
that  the  first  troops  he  sent  up  were  driven  out  of  the 
country,  and  he  was  enabled  to  establish  himself  in  it 
only  by  claiming  the  assistance  of  the  Indian  Govern- 
ment, and  getting  from  it  an  order  that  the  existing 
Governor  was  to  yield  obedience  to  the  new  sovereign, 
or  to  consider  himself  an  enemy  of  the  British  Govern- 
ment. No  doubt  we  wanted  the  money  very  much  at 
the  time,  miserable  sum  as  it  was,  and  only  double  the 
revenue  which  Ranjit  Singh  drew  in  one  year  from 
Kashmir.  It  is  possible,  too,  that  there  may  have  been 
some  policy  in  thus  making  a  friend  of  one  of  the  chiefs 
of  the  Khalsa ;  but  the  transaction  was  not  an  advisable 
one.  Of  all  India  and  its  adjacent  countries,  Kashmir 
is  the  district  best  suited  for  Europeans,  and  it  affords 
large  room  for  English  colonisation.  It  has  now  a 
population  of  about  half  a  million  ;  but  it  had  formerly 
one  of  four  millions,  and  it  could  easily  support  that 
number.  It  has  an  immense  amount  of  fertile  land 
lying  waste  in  all  the  valleys,  and  it  would  have  been 
just  the  place  for  the  retirement  of  Anglo-Indians  at 
the  close  of  their  periods  of  service.  As  it  is,  Kashmir 
is  practically  closed  to  us  except  as  a  place  of  resort  for 
a  few  summer  visitors.  Probably  the  visitors  would  be 
a  good  deal  worse  off  than  they  are  at  present  if  it  were 
under  British  rule;  but  that  is  not  a  matter  of  much 
importance.  The  Maharajah  acknowledges  the  supre- 
macy of  the  British  Government,  and  yet  no  Englishman 
can  settle  in  the  country  or  purchase  a  foot  of  land  in  it. 
We  are  not  even  allowed  to  stay  there  through  the 
winter;  for  a  recent  relaxation  of  this  rule  has  been 
much  misunderstood,  and  simply  amounts  to  a  permis- 


KASHMIR.  303 


sion  for  British  officers,  who  cannot  get  leave  in  summer, 
to  visit  Kashmir  in  winter.  Visitors  have  to  leave  the 
country  about  the  middle  of  October,  and  the  Panjab 
Government  has  issued  very  strict  rules  for  their  guid- 
ance while  they  are  in  the  Valley.  After  mentioning 
the  four  authorised  routes  for  European  visitors  to 
Kashmir,  the  first  rule  goes  on  to  say  (the  italics  are  its 
own),  "All  other  roads  are  positively  forbidden  ;  and,  in 
respect  to  the  direct  road  from  Jummoo  (known  as  the 
Bunnihal  route),  the  prohibition  has  been  ordered  at  the 
special  request  of  his  Highness  the  Maharajah.  The 
road  branching  from  Rajaoree  by  Aknoor,  which  is 
used  by  the  Maharajah's  family  and  troops,  is  also 
expressly  prohibited."  Now  this  Jamu  and  Banihal 
route  is  by  much  the  shortest  and  much  the  easiest 
route  to  Kashmir,  except  for  the  small  section  of  visitors 
who  come  from  that  part  of  the  Panjab  which  lie's  to 
the  west  of  the  Jhelam  ;  and  yet  it  is  kept  closed,  at 
the  Maharajah's  special  request,  though  another  route 
is  set  apart  for  the  movements  between  Srinagar  and 
Jamu  of  his  family  and  troops  !  In  fact,  by  this  order, 
in  order  to  get  a  tolerable  route,  the  traveller  has  to 
cross  great  part  of  the  Panjab  and  go  up  by  Ravval 
Pindi  and  Mari,  for  neither  the  Pir  Panjal  nor  the 
Punah  routes  are  convenient.  In  Rule  II.  we  are  told 
that  every  officer  about  to  visit  Kashmir  "should  en- 
gage, before  proceeding,  a  sufficient  number  of  ponies 
or  mules  for  the  conveyance  of  his  baggage ;  "  which  is 
tantamount  to  saying  that  no  one  need  put  in  a  claim 
for  getting  any  coolies,  ponies,  or  mules  by  the  way. 
In  Rule  VI.  they  are  told  to  encamp  only  at  the  fixed 
stages  and  encamping-grounds.  In  Rule  X.  it  is  said 
that  "  when  going  out  on  shooting  excursions,  visitors 
are  to  take  carriage  and  supplies  with  them."  Rule 
XV.   is  amusing,    considering   the   high    moral   tone   of 


304  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

the  British  subaltern :  "  Officers  are  not  allowed  to 
take  away  with  them,  either  in  their  service,  or  with 
their  camps,  any  subjects  of  the  Maharajah,  without 
obtaining  permission  and  a  passport  from  the  author- 
ities." I  have  heard  of  one  visitor  who  tried  to  take 
away  a  Kashmiri  damsel  by  putting  her  in  a  kilta, 
or  wicker-basket  used  for  carrying  loads  in,  but  the 
smuggling  was  detected.  This  rule  does  not  prevent 
the  bagnios  all  over  India  being  filled  with  Kashmiri 
women  ;  and  a  regular  slave-traffic  goes  on,  most  of  the 
good-looking  girls  being  taken  out  of  Kashmir  at  an 
early  age ;  but,  of  course,  the  morals  of  the  British 
officer  must  be  looked  after.  He  is  also  by  Rule  XVI. 
made  responsible  for  the  debts  incurred  by  his  servants, 
which  is  rather  hard,  as  most  Indians  make  a  rule  of 
getting  into  debt  up  to  the  full  amount  of  their  credit. 
In  Rule  XVII.,  all  visitors  are  told,  in  italics,  "All 
presents  to  be  refused.  Presents  of  every  description 
must  be  rigidly  refused."  This  certainly  is  interfering 
in  an  extraordinary  way  with  the  liberty  of  the  subject; 
but  let  the  visitor  beware  how  he  violates  any  of  these 
rules,  because  the  Resident  at  Srinagar  has  the  power 
of  expelling  him  from  the  country.  It  is  the  Panjab, 
not  the  supreme  Government,  which  is  directly  respon- 
sible for  these  extraordinary  regulations  ;  and  I  daresay 
English  people  will  be  rather  surprised  by  them.  The 
Maharajah  of  Kashmir  is  called  in  them  "an  indepen- 
dent sovereign;"  but  it  is  distinctly  stated  in  Article  X. 
of  the  Treaty  which  gave  him  his  dominions,  that  he 
"acknowledges  the  supremacy  of  the  British  Govern- 
ment." Can  the  Panjab  Government  not  understand 
that  when  the  power  of  England  guarantees  the  safety 
of  the  Maharajah  and  of  his  dominions,  it  is  not  for 
British  officials  to  treat  British  visitors  to  Kashmir  in 
so   derogatory  a    manner,   or   to    allow  of  their   being 


KASHMIR.  305 


turned  out  of  the  country  every  winter,  and  refused 
permission  to  purchase  even  waste  land  ?  This  is  only 
one  of  many  subjects  which  may  render  it  necessary 
to  raise  the  questions,  —  In  whose  interest,  on  whose 
authority,  and  supported  by  what  power,  does  Anglo- 
Indian  officialdom  exist  ?  The  imperial  interests  of 
Great  Britain  have  been  too  much  lost  sight  of,  and  it  is 
on  these  that  the  real,  the  vital  interests  of  the  people  of 
India  depend. 

The  Resident  procured  me  a  private  audience  of  the 
Maharajah  Ranbir  or  Runbir  Singh,  which  was  given 
in  a  balcony,  overhanging  the  river,  of  his  city  palace, 
within  the  precincts  of  which  there  is  a  temple  with  a 
large  pagoda-like  roof  that  is  covered  with  thin  plates 
of  pure  gold.  His  Highness  is  reputed  to  be  somewhat 
serious  and  bigoted  as  regards  his  religion.  It  was  men- 
tioned in  the  Indian  papers  a  few  years  ago,  that  the 
Brahmins  having  discovered  that  the  soul  of  his  father, 
Golab  Singh,  had  migrated  into  the  body  of  a  fish,  Ran- 
bir Singh  gave  orders  that  no  fish  were  to  be  killed  in 
Kashmir,  though  fish  is  there  one  of  the  great  staple 
articles  of  food  among  the  poorer  classes.  The  edict, 
however,  was  calculated  to  cause  so  much  distress,  that 
the  Brahmins  soon  announced  that  the  paternal  spirit 
had  taken  some  other  form.  I  never  heard  this  story 
contradicted  ;  and  it  affords  a  curious  instance  of  the 
reality  of  the  belief  in  transmigration  which  exists  in 
India.  As  the  character  of  these  transmigrations,  and 
the  amount  of  suffering  and  enjoyment  which  they 
involve,  is  considered  to  depend  on  the  good  or  evil 
conduct  of  preceding  lives,  and  especially  of  those  which 
are  passed  in  a  human  form,  such  a  belief  would  be 
calculated  to  exercise  an  important  influence  for  good, 
were  it  not  for  the  sacrificial  theory  which  attaches  so 
much   importance,  as  good   works,  to  sacrifices   to   the 

u 


306  THE  A%ODE  OF  SNOW. 

god;;,  and  to  gifts  to  their  priestly  ministers;  and  its 
beneficial  effect  is  also  lessened  by  the  tendency  of  the 
Indian  mind  to  assign  an  undue  value  to  indiscriminate 
acts  of  charity,  such  as  often  do  harm  rather  than  good. 
It  is  curious  to  think  of  a  Maharajah  looking  from  his 
balcony  beside  his  golden  temple  into  the  waters  of  the 
Jhelam,  and  wondering  whether  his  royal  father  is  one 
of  the  big  or  of  the  little  fishes  floating  about  in  its 
stream  or  in  some  adjacent  water. 

Some  visitors  to  Kashmir  have  blamed  its  ruler 
severely  for  the  condition  of  the  country — as,  for  in- 
stance, Dr  Adams,  who  says  :  "  It  is  vain,  however,  to 
hope  that  there  can  be  any  progress  under  the  present 
ruler,  who,  like  his  father,  is  bent  on  self-aggrandise- 
ment.'"' This,  however,  is  entirely  opposed  to  the  sub- 
stance of  many  conversations  I  had  on  the  subject  with 
Mr  Wynne,  who  seemed  to  regard  his  Highness  as  one 
of  the  very  few  honest  men  there  were  in  the  country, 
sincerely  anxious  for  the  welfare  of  its  inhabitants  ;  and 
he  mentioned  to  me  various  circumstances  which  sup- 
ported that  conclusion.  Without  going  beyond  diplo- 
matic reserve,  he  said  it  was  only  to  be  hoped  that  the 
Maharajah's  sons  would  follow  their  father's  example.  I 
do  not  profess  to  see  into  a  millstone  farther  than  other 
people,  but  may  say  that  the  little  I  saw  of  this  prince 
conveyed  a  superficial  impression  quite  in  accordance 
with  Mr  Wynne's  opinion.  He  seemed  an  earnest,  over- 
burdened man,  seriously  anxious  to  fulfil  the  duties  of 
his  high  position,  and  heavily  weighed  down  by  them  ; 
but  it  can  easily  be  conceived  how  little  he  can  do  in 
a -country  which  has  been  from  time  immemorial  in  so 
wretched  a  state,  and  how  much  reason  he  may  have 


*  "Wanderings  of  a  Naturalist  in  India."     By  A.  L.  Adams,   M.D. 
Edinburgh,  1S67.     P.  296. 


KASHMIR.  307 


for  wishing  that  he  were  expiating  his  shortcomings  in 
the  form  of  a  fish.  And  it  should  not  be  forgotten  that 
this  prince  was  faithful  to  us,  and  in  a  very  useful 
manner,  at  the  time  of  the  great  Indian  Mutiny  ;  for  he 
sent  six  battalions  of  infantry,  two  squadrons  of  cavalry, 
and  a  battery  of  guns,  to  assist  us  at  the  siege  of  Delhi ; 
and,  by  this,  considerable  moral  support  was  afforded  at 
the  moment  to  the  British  Raj.  I  met,  going  down  the 
Jhelam,  a  Kashmir  regiment  which  had  been  at  the  siege 
of  Delhi,  and  the  officer  in  command  spoke  with  some 
pride,  but  by  no  means  in  a  boasting  or  offensive  way, 
of  his  having  fought  along  with  English  troops. 

Among  the  improvements  introduced  by  Ranbir 
Singh  are  those  in  the  administration  of  justice  and  the 
manufacture  of  silk.  The  Chief-Justice  of  the  court  of 
Srinagar  is  an  educated  native,  I  think  from  Bengal, 
who  was  well  spoken  of — and,  absurdly  enough,  is  in 
charge  of  the  silk  department  also.  He  has  been  at 
pains  to  make  himself  acquainted  with  the  breeding  of 
silk-worms  and  the  spinning  of  their  cocoons,  as  pursued 
in  other  countries,  and  has  turned  this  knowledge  to 
good  account  in  Srinagar.  One  pleasing  and  extra- 
ordinary innovation  which  he  has  been  able  to  introduce 
is  that  of  inducing  children  and  others  of  the  Brahmin 
caste  to  engage  in  the  spinning  of  silk.  Anything  like 
such  an  occupation  has  hitherto  been  considered  as  de- 
grading, and  forbidden  to  Brahmins,  and  has  not  been 
entered  on  by  those  even  in  such  advanced  Indian  cities 
as  Calcutta  and  Bombay.  It  shows  a  curious  way  of 
managing  matters  that  the  Chief-Justice  of  Srinagar 
should  also  be  the  head  of  the  silk  department ;  but 
such  is,  or  at  least  very  lately  was,  the  case ;  and  under 
his  management  sericulture  has  been  improved  and  de- 
veloped. In  1 87 1,  the  Maharajah  set  apart  ^30,000  for 
the  development  of  this  branch  of  industry,  and  part  of 


308  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

the  sum  was  expended  on  the  construction  of  buildings 
in  which  an  equal  temperature  could  be  maintained  for 
the  silk-worms.  I  saw  the  process  of  extracting  and 
winding  the  silk  in  the  factory  beside  Srinagar :  it  was 
skilfully  conducted,  and  the  threads  produced  were 
remarkably  fine  and  perfect.  The  mulberry  trees  of 
Kashmir  have  hitherto  enjoyed  exemption  from  disease 
and  injury  from  insects,  so  that  the  prospects  of  this 
production  are  very  good,  and  a  commencement  has 
been  made  in  weaving  the  silk  into  cloth.  The  whole 
production  is  a  monopoly  of  Government ;  but  it  gives 
increasing  employment  to  a  considerable  number  of 
persons,  on  what,  for  Kashmir,  are  good  wages.  In 
1872  the  amount  of  dry  cocoons  produced  amounted  to 
57,600  lbs.,  and  the  resulting  revenue  was  estimated  at 
1 24,000  chilki  rupees,  a  portion  of  it,  however,  being  re- 
quired for  the  improvements  which  were  made. 

The  famous  shawls  of  Kashmir  are  now  somewhat  at 
a  discount  in  the  world,  except  in  France,  where  they 
still  form  a  portion  of  almost  every  bride's  trousseau, 
and  where,  at  least  in  novels,  every  lady  of  the  demi- 
monde is  described  as  wrapped  in  tin  vrai  Cachemere,  and 
wearing  a  pair  of  Turkish  slippers.  France  alone  takes 
about  80  per  cent,  of  the  Kashmir  shawls  exported  from 
Asia  ;  the  United  States  of  America  take  IO,  Italy  5, 
Russia  2,  and  Great  Britain  and  Germany  only  1  per 
cent  each.  Of  course  the  late  war  almost  entirely  de- 
stroyed the  shawl  trade,  but  it  has  for  the  time  being 
returned  to  its  former  state ;  and,  at  the  period  of 
collapse,  the  Maharajah  humanely  made  enormous  pur- 
chases on  his  own  account.  The  revenue  from  this 
source  has  diminished  to  at  least  half  what  it  was  some 
years  ago  ;  but  still  a  superior  woven  shawl  will  bring, 
even  in  Kashmir,  as  much  as  £300  sterling;  and  about 
£1 30,000  worth  of  shawls  is  annually  exported,  ,£90,000 


KASHMIR.  309 


worth  going  to  Europe.  The  finest  of  the  goat's  wool 
employed  in  this  manufacture  comes  from  Turfan,  in 
the  Yarkund  territory  ;  and  it  is  only  on  the  wind-swept 
steppes  of  Central  Asia  that  animals  are  found  to  pro- 
duce so  fine  a  wool.  The  shawl-weavers  get  miserable 
wages,  and  are  allowed  neither  to  leave  Kashmir  nor 
change  their  employment,  so  that  they  are  nearly  in  the 
position  of  slaves ;  and  their  average  wage  is  only  about 
three-halfpence  a  day. 

Srinagar  itself  has  a  very  fine  appearance  when  one 
does  not  look  closely  into  its  details.  As  the  Kashmiri 
has  been  called  the  Neapolitan  of  the  East,  so  his  capital 
has  been  compared  to  Florence,  and  his  great  river  to 
the  Arno.  But  there  is  no  European  town  which  has 
such  a  fine  placid  sweep  of  river  through  it.  The  capital 
dates  from  59  A.D.,  and  portions  of  it  might  be  set  down 
to  any  conceivable  date.  For  the  most  part,  the  houses 
either  rise  up  from  the  Jhelam  or  from  the  canals  with 
which  the  city  is  intersected,  and  are  chiefly  of  thin  brick 
walls  supported  in  wooden  frames.  Being  often  three 
storeys  high,  and  in  a  most  ruinous  condition,  the  walls 
present  anything  but  straight  lines,  and  it  is  a  marvel  that 
many  of  the  houses  continue  standing  at  all.  Some  of 
the  canals  present  deliciously  picturesque  scenes,  such 
as  even  Venice  cannot  boast  of,  and  the  view  from  any 
of  the  five  bridges  across  the  Jhelam  is  very  striking; 
but,  as  remarked,  it  is  better  to  leave  the  interior  un- 
visited  beyond  floating  through  the  canals.  The  British 
Residency,  and  the  bungalows  provided  free  of  charge 
for  European  visitors,  are  above  the  city,  on  the  right 
bank  of  the  river,  which  here  presents  a  noble  appear- 
ance, and  in  a  splendid  line  of  poplar-trees.  A  wooded 
island  opposite  them  adds  to  the  beauty  of  the  scene. 
Almost  every  place  about  Srinagar  that  one  wants  to 
go  to  can  be  reached  by  boat,  and  the  wearied  traveller 
may  enjoy  a  delicious  repose. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

SCENES  IN  KASHMIR. 

I  MUST  now  refer  briefly  to  a  few  more  picturesque 
places  in  that  beautiful  country.  There  is  one  ex- 
cursion from  Srinagar,  which  can  easily  be  made  in  a 
day  by  boat,  that  is  specially  worthy  of  notice,  and 
it  takes  through  canals  and  through  the  apple-tree 
garden  into  the  Dal-o  City  Lake,  and  to  two  of  the 
gardens  and  summer-houses  of  the  Mogul  Emperors. 
I  write  on  the  shore  of  Ulleswater,  at  once  the  grandest 
and  most  beautiful  of  the  English  lakes :  the  moun- 
tains and  sky  are  reflected  with  perfect  distinctness 
in  the  deep  unruffled  water,  and  the  renewed  power  of 
the  earth  is  running  up  through  the  trees,  and  breaking 
out  into  a  dim  mist  of  buds  and  tiny  leaves;  but  ex- 
quisite as  the  scene  before  me  is,  its  beauty  cannot 
dim  or  equal  my  remembrance  of  the  lakes  of  Kashmir, 
though  even  to  these  the  English  scenery  is  superior  as 
regards  the  quality,  to  use  a  phrase  of  Wordsworth's,  of 
being  "graduated  by  nature  into  soothing  harmony." 

The  Dal  is  connected  with  the  Jhelam  by  the  Sont-i- 
Kol  or  ^\pple-tree  Canal,  which  presents  one  of  the  finest 
combinations  of  wood  and  water  in  the  world.  The 
scene  is  English  in  character ;  but  I  do  not  know  of  any 
river  scene  in  England  which  is  equal  to  it — so  calm  is 
the  water,  so  thickly  is  the  stream  covered  with  tame 
aquatic  birds  of  very  varied  plumage,  so  abundant  the 
fish,  so  magnificent,  as  well  as  beautiful,  the  trees  which 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  311 

rise  from  its  lotus-fringed,  smooth,  green  banks.  An 
Afghan  conqueror  of  Kashmir  proposed  to  cover  this 
piece  of  water  with  a  trellis-work  of  vines,  supported 
from  the  trees  on  the  one  side  to  those  on  the  other; 
but  that  would  have  shut  out  the  view  of  the  high,  wild 
mountains,  which  heighten,  by  their  contrast,  the  beauty 
and  peacefulness  of  the  scene  below.  Many  of  the  trees, 
and  a  whole  line  of  them  on  one  side,  are  enormous 
planes  {Plat anus  orien talis),  mountains  of  trees,  and  yet 
beautiful  in  shape  and  colour,  with  their  vast  masses  of 
foliage  reflected  in  the  calm,  clear  water. 

From  thence  we  pass  into  the  Dal,  a  lake  about  five 
miles  long,  with  half  the  distance  in  breadth,  one  side 
being  bounded  by  great  trees,  or  fading  into  a  reedy 
waste,  and  the  other  encircled  by  lofty  mountains.  The 
most  curious  feature  of  this  lake  is  the  floating  gardens 
upon  the  surface  of  its  transparent  water.  The  reeds, 
sedges,  water-lilies,  and  other  aquatic  plants  which  grow 
together  in  tangled  confusion,  are,  when  they  cluster 
together  more  thickly  than  usual,  detached  from  their 
roots.  The  leaves  of  the  plants  are  then  spread  out 
over  the  stems  and  covered  with  soil,  on  which  melons 
and  cucumbers  are  grown.  These  floating  islands  form 
a  curious  and  picturesque  feature  in  the  landscape,  and 
their  economical  uses  are  considerable.  Moorcroft  men- 
tions having  seen  vines  upon  them,  and  has  supplied  the 
detailed  information  regarding  them  which  has  been 
made  use  of  by  succeeding  travellers  and  statisticians. 
"  A  more  economical  method  of  raising  cucumbers  can- 
not be  devised," — and,  he  might  have  added,  of  melons 
also.     According  to  Cowper — 

"  No  sordid  fare, 
A  cucumber !  " 

But,  thanks  to  these  floating  gardens,  you  don't  require 
to  ruin  yourself  in  order  to  eat  cucumbers  in  Kashmir  ; 


3i2  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

and  the  melons  are  as  good  as  they  are  cheap,  and  must 
have  valuable  properties  ;  for  Captain  Bates  says,  "  those 
who  live  entirely  on  them  soon  become  fat,"  which  pro- 
bably arises  from  the  sugar  they  contain.  Usually,  in 
the  fruit  season,  two  or  three  watchers  remain  all  night  in 
a  boat  attached  to  these  islands,  in  order  to  protect  them 
from  water-thieves.  On  the  Dal  I  came  across  several 
boatmen  fishing  up  the  root  of  the  lotus  with  iron  hooks 
attached  to  long  poles.  This  yellow  root  is  not  unpalat- 
able raw,  but  is  usually  eaten  boiled,  along  with  condi- 
ments. Southey's  lines,  though  strictly  applicable  only 
to  the  red-flowering  lotus,  yet  suggest  a  fair  idea  of  the 
lotus-leaves  on  this  Kashmir  lake,  as  they  are  moved  by 
the  wind  or  the  undulations  of  the  water. 

"  Around  the  lotus  stem 
It  rippled,  and  the  sacred  flowers,  that  crown 
The  lakelet  with  their  roseate  beauty,  ride 
In  gen 'lest  waving,  rocked  from  side  to  side  ; 
And  as  the  wind  upheaves 

Their  broad  and  buoyant  weight,  the  glossy  leaves 
Flap  on  the  twinkling  waters  up  and  down." 

Still  more  useful  for  the  people  of  Kashmir,  as  an 
article  of  diet,  is  the  horned  water-nut  {Traba  bispinosd), 
which  is  ground  into  flour,  and  made  into  bread.  No 
less  than  60,000  tons  of  it  are  said  to  be  taken  from  the 
Wular  Lake  alone  every  season,  or  sufficient  to  supply 
about  13,000  people  with  food  for  the  entire  year.  These 
nuts  are  to  be  distinguished  from  the  nuts,  or  rather 
beans,  of  the  lotus  (Nelumbiwn  speciostmi),  which  are 
also  used  as  an  article  of  food,  and  prized  as  a  delicacy. 
These,  with  the  lotus-roots,  and  the  immense  quantity 
(if  fish,  provide  abundance  of  food  for  a  much  larger 
population  than  is  to  be  found  in  the  neighbourhood  of 
the  Kashmir  lakes  ;  but  of  what  avail  is  such  bounty  of 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  313 

Providence  when  the  first   conditions   of   human   pros- 
perity are  wanting  ? 

Passing  the  Silver  Island  and  the  Island  of  Chunars, 
I  went  up  to  the  Shalimar  Bagh,  or  Garden  of  Delight, 
a  garden  and  pleasure-house,  the  work  of  the  Emperor 
Jehangfr  and  of  his  spouse  Nur  Jahan  ;  but  fine  as  this 
place  is,  I  preferred  the  Nishat  Bagh,  or  Garden  of  Plea- 
sure, which  is  more  in  a  recess  of  the  lake,  and  also  was 
a  retreat  constructed  by  the  same  royal  pair,  and  planned 
by  the  Empress  herself.  The  Garden  of  Pleasure  is 
more  picturesquely  situated,  though  shaded  by  not  less 
magnificent  trees.  The  mountains  rise  up  close  behind 
it,  and  suggest  a  safe  retreat  both  from  the  dangers  and 
the  cares  of  state  ;  and  its  view  of  the  lake,  including 
the  Sona  Lank,  or  Golden  Island,  is  more  suggestive  of 
seclusion  and  quiet  enjoyment.  Ten  terraces,  bounded 
by  magnificent  trees,  and  with  a  stream  of  water  falling 
over  them,  lead  up  to  the  latticed  pavilion  at  the  end  of 
this  garden.  Between  the  double  storeys  of  this  pavilion 
the  stream  flows  through  a  marble,  or,  at  least,  a  lime- 
stone tank,  and  the  structure  is  shaded  by  great  chuiidr 
trees,  while,  through  a  vista  of  their  splendid  foliage,  we 
look  down  the  terraces  and  watercourses  upon  the  lake 
below.  This  was,  and  still  is,  a  fitting  place  in  which  a 
great,  luxurious,  and  pleasure-loving  emperor  might  find 
repose,  and  gather  strength  for  the  more  serious  duties 
of  power.  Jehangfr  was  a  strange  but  intelligible  cha- 
racter. One  historian  briefly  says  of  him — "Himself 
a  drunkard  during  his  whole  life,  he  punished  all  who 
used  wine."-  And  after  the  unsuccessful  rebellion  of  his 
son  Khusru,  he  made  that  prince  pass  along  a  line  of 
700  of  his  friends  who  had  assisted  him  in  rebelling. 
These  friends  were  all  seated  upon  spikes — in  fact,  they 
were  impaled  ;  so  we  may  see  it  was  not  without  good 
reason  that  Jehangfr  occasionally  sought  for  secluded 


3H  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

places  of  retirement.  But  these  characteristics,  taken 
alone,  give  an  unfair  idea  of  this  great  ruler.  Though 
he  never  entirely  shook  off  the  dipsomaniac  habits  which 
he  had  formed  at  an  early  age,  yet  it  may  have  been  an 
acute  sense  of  the  inconvenience  of  them  which  made 
him  so  anxious  to  prevent  any  of  his  subjects  from 
falling  into  the  snare  ;  he  hints  an  opinion  that  though 
his  own  head  might  stand  liquor  without  much  damage, 
it  by  no  means  followed  that  other  people's  heads  could 
do  so  ;  and  the_  severe  punishment  of  the  adherents  of  a 
rebellious  son  was,  in  his  time,  almost  necessary  to  secure 
the  throne.  He  did,  in  fact,  love  mercy  as  well  as  do 
justice,  and  was  far  from  being  a  bad  ruler.  ,He  was 
wont  to  say  that  he  would  rather  lose  all  the  rest  of  his 
empire  than  Kashmir  ;'*  and  it  is  likely  that  in  this  and 
similar  gardens  he  enjoyed  the  most  pleasure  which  his 
life  afforded.  His  companion  there  was  Mihrunnisa 
Khanam,  better  known  as  Nur  Jahan,  "  the  Light  of  the 
World. "t  When  a  young  prince  he  had  seen  and  loved 
her,  but  they  were  separated  by  circumstances  ;  and  it 
was  not  until  after  the  death  of  her  husband,  Sher 
Afkan,  and  he  had  overcome  her  dread  of  marrying  one 
whom  she  supposed  to  have  been  her  husband's  mur- 
derer, that  Mihrunnisa  became  Jehangi'r's  wife,  and 
received  the  name  of  the  Light  of  the  World.  A  great 
improvement  in  the  Emperor's  government  resulted 
from  this  union  :  the  story  is  a  curious  illustration  of 
the  abiding  power  of  love,  and  it  goes  far  to  redeem 
the  character  of  this  dissipated  emperor,  who  would 
allow  nobody  to  get  drunk  except  himself.    I  daresay,  if 

*  "  Voyages  de  Francis  Bernier,  contenant  la  Description  des  Etats  du 
Grand  Mogol."     Amsterdam,  1699. 

t  She  was  also,  for  a  time,  called  Nur  Mahal,  the  Light  of  the  Palace  ; 
and  under  this  name  must  be  distinguished  from  the  queen  of  Jehan^h's 
son.  Shah  lahan,  to  whom  was  raised  the  wonderful  Taj  Mahal  at  Agra. 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  315 

the  truth  were  known,  the  Light  of  the  World  must 
have  had  a  sad  time  of  it  with  her  amorous  lord  ;  but 
she  was  at  least  devoted  to  him,  and  seriously  risked  her 
life  for  him  when  the  audacious  Mahabat  Khan  unex- 
pectedly made  him  a  prisoner.  The  memory  of  these 
faithful  lovers  seems  still  to  linger  about  the  Nishat 
Bagh,  and  to  have  transferred  itself  into  the  imperial 
splendour  of  the  plane-trees,  the  grateful  shadow  of  the 
mountains,  and  the  soft  dreamy  vista  over  the  placid 
lake. 

Nearly  all  the  English  visitors  had  left  Kashmir  before 
I  reached  that  country,  and  this  gave  me  more  oppor- 
tunity of  enjoying  the  society  of  Mr  Le  Poer  Wynne, 
of  whom  I  may  speak  more  freely  than  of  other  Indian 
officials  who  remain.  Two  or  three  officers,  on  their  way 
out  of  the  valley,  appeared  at  the  Residency,  and  a 
couple  of  young  Englishmen,  or  Colonials,  fresh  from 
the  Antipodes,  who  could  see  little  to  admire  in  Kash- 
mir;  but  the  only  resident  society  in  Srinagar  was  a 
fine  Frenchman,  a  shawl  agent,  and  Colonel  Gardiner, 
who  commanded  the  Maharajah's  artillery,  a  soldier  of 
fortune  ninety  years  of  age.  Colonel  Gardiner  was 
born  on  the  shores  of  Lake  Superior,  and  had  wandered 
into  Central  Asia  at  an  early  period.  There  was  some- 
thing almost  appalling  in  -hearing  this  ancient  warrior 
discourse  of  what  have  now  become  almost  prehistoric 
times,  and  relate  his  experiences  in  the  service  of  Ranji't 
Singh,  Shah  Shuja,  Dost  Mohammed,  and  other  kings 
and  chiefs  less  known  to  fame.  If  (as  I  have  no  reason 
to  believe)  he  occasionally  confused  hearsay  with  his 
own  experience,  it  could  scarcely  be  wondered  at  con- 
sidering his  years,  and  there  is  no  doubt  as  to  the 
general  facts  of  .his  career.  Listening  to  his  -graphic 
narrations,  Central  Asia  vividly  appeared  as  it  was  more 
than  half  a  century  ago,  when  Englishmen  could  traverse 


316  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

it  not  only  with  tolerable  safety,  but  usually  as  honoured 
guests. 

But  most  usually  the  Resident  and  myself  spent  our 
evenings  tete-d-tete,  no  one  coming  in  except  an  old 
Afghan  cJuiprassie,  whose  business  it  was  to  place  logs 
upon  the  fire.  This  Abdiel  had  been  a  sepoy,  and  was 
the  only  man  in  his  regiment  who  had  remained  faithful 
at  the  time  of  the  Mutiny — "  among  the  faithless,  faithful 
only  he;"  and  the  honesty  of  his  character  extended 
down  into  his  smallest  transactions.  He  took  a  paternal 
but  respectful  interest  in  us,  clearly  seeing  that  the  fire 
must  be  kept  up,  though  our  conversation  ought  not  to 
be  disturbed  ;  so  he  would  steal  into  the  room  as  quietly 
as  possible,  and  place  logs  on  the  fire  as  gently  as  if  we 
were  dying  warriors  or  Mogul  emperors.  Wynne  him- 
self was  a  man  of  very  interesting  mind  and  character, 
being  at  once  gentle  and  firm,  kindly  and  open,  yet  with 
much  tact,  and  combining  depth  of  thought  with  very 
wide  culture.  When  a  student,  he  had  employed  his  long 
vacations  in  attending  the  universities  of  Germany  and 
France,  and  was  widely  acquainted  with  the  literature  of 
these  countries,  as  well  as  able  to  converse  fluently  in 
their  languages.  To  the  usual  Oriental  studies  of  an 
Indian  civilian,  he  had  added  a  large  acquaintance  with 
Persian  poetry,  and  really  loved  the  country  to  which  he 
had  devoted  himself,  chiefly  from  a  desire  to  find  a  more 
satisfactory  and  useful  career  than  is  now  open  to  young 
men  at  home  with  little  or  no  fortune.  Perhaps  he  was 
too  much  of  a  student,  disposed  to  place  too  high  a  value 
on  purely  moral  and  intellectual  influences,  and  too  much 
given  to  expect  that  young  officers  should  renounce  all 
the  follies  of  youth,  and  old  fighting  colonels  conduct 
themselves  as  if  they  were  children  of  light.  That  sprang, 
however,  from  perfect  genuineness  and  beauty  of  char- 
acter, to  which  all  things  evil,  or  even  questionable,  were 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  3 1 7 

naturally  repulsive  ;  and  it  was  wholly  unaccompanied 
by  any  tendency  to  condemn  others,  being  simply  a 
desire  to  encourage  them  towards  good.  There  was  not 
a  little  of  the  pure  and  chivalrous  nature  of  Sir  Philip 
Sidney  in  Le  Poer  Wynne  ;  and  he  might  also  be  com- 
pared in  character  to  the  late  Frederick  Robertson  of 
Brighton,  whose  sermons  he  spoke  to  me  of  as  having 
made  quite  an  era  in  his  life.  European  culture  and 
thought  had  not  taught  him  to  undervalue  either  the 
methods  or  the  results  of  "  divine  philosophy,"  nor  had 
his  mind  been  overwhelmed  by  the  modern  revelations 
of  the  physical  universe,  though  he  was  well  acquainted 
with  them  ;  and  his  departure  from  much  of  traditional 
theology  had  only  led  him  to  value  more  the  abiding 
truths  of  religion.  Our  conversation  related  only  in  part 
to  the  East,  and  ranged  over  many  fields  of  politics, 
philosophy,  and  literature.  I  cannot  recall  these  nights 
at  Srinagar  without  mingled  sadness  and  pleasure.  It 
never  struck  me  then  that  we  were  in  a  house  at  all,  but 
rather  as  if  we  were  by  a  camp-fire.  My  host  had  a  way 
of  reclining  before  the  fire  on  the  floor ;  the  flames  of 
the  wood  shot  up  brilliantly  ;  brown  Abdiel  in  his  sheep- 
skin coat  suggested  the  Indian  Caucasus;  and  instead 
of  the  gaudily-painted  woodwork  of  the  Residency,  I  felt 
around  us  only  the  circle  of  snowy  mountains,  and  above, 
the  shining  hosts  of  heaven.  And  to  both  of  us  this  was 
a  camp-fire,  and  an  unexpected  happy  meeting  in  the 
wilderness  of  life.  A  few  months  afterwards,  Mr  Wynne, 
after  a  short  run  to  Europe  on  privilege-leave,  returned 
to  Calcutta,  in  order  to  take  up  the  office  of  Foreign 
Secretary  during  the  absence  of  Mr  Aitchison,  and  died 
almost  immediately  after.  He  had  not  been  many  years 
in  the  Indian  Civil  Service,  and  the  highest  hopes  were 
entertained  of  his  future  career.  I  had  felt,  however,  in- 
stinctively, that  so  fine  an  organisation,  both  mental  and 


3 1 8  THE  A  BODE  OF  SNO  W. 

physical,  must  either  "  die  or  be  degraded;"  and  per- 
haps it  was  with  some  subtle,  barely  conscious  precog- 
nition of  his  early  doom  that  Wynne  rose  and  made  a 
note  of  the  lines  which  I  quoted  to  him  one  night  when 
we  were  speaking  of  the  early  death  of  another  young 
Indian  civilian — 

"  But  the  fair  guerdon  when  we  hope  to  find, 
And  think  to  burst  out  into  sudden  blaze, 
Comes  the  blind  Fury  with  th'  abhorred  shears, 
And  slits  the  thin-spun  life.     But  not  the  praise." 

But  praise,  or  fame,  as  here  used  by  Milton  and  some 
of  our  older  writers,  is  not  to  be  confounded  with  the 
notoriety  of  the  world,  which  almost  any  eccentricity, 
vulgarity,  self-assertion,  or  accidental  success  may  com- 
mand. It  is  even  something  more  than  the  "  good  and 
honest  report"  of  the  multitude,  or  the  approval  of  the 
better-minded  of  the  human  race,  both  of  which  judg- 
ments must  often  proceed  on  very  imperfect  and  mis- 
leading grounds.  Milton  himself  expressed  the  truest 
meaning  of  fame  when  Phcebus  touched  his  trembling 
ears,  and,  immediately  after  the  passage  just  quoted,  he 
went  on  to  say — ■ 

"  Fame  is  no  plant  that  grows  on  mortal  soil, 
Nor  in  the  glistening  foil 
Set  off  to  th'  world,  nor  in  broad  rumour  lies, 
But  lives  and  spreads  aloft  by  those  pure  eyes, 
And  perfect  witness  of  all-judging  Jove  ; 
As  he  pronounces  lastly  on  each  deed, 
Of  so  much  fame  in  heaven  expect  thy  meed." 

It  must  be  fancied  that  the  poet  is  rather  inconsistent 
here,  because  he  begins  by  speaking  of  fame  as  "  the  last 
infirmity  of  noble  minds  ;  "  and  surely  it  can  hardly  be 
an  infirmity  to  value  the  judgment  which  proceeds  from 
the  "perfect  witness  of  all-judging  Jove."  But  there  is 
no  inconsistency  when  the  whole  passage  in  "Lycidas  "  is 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.^  319 

considered,  beginning,  "  Alas!  what  boots  it  with  inces- 
sant care ?  "     The  argument  is  that  it  must  matter 

nothing,  seeing  that  when  we  expect  to  find  the  guerdon 
and  break  out  into  sudden  blaze,  then  comes  Fate  with 
the  abhorred  shears  ;  but  to  this  Phcebus  answers  re- 
provingly that  fame  is  not  of  mortal  growth,  and  only 
lives  and  spreads  above.  This  suggests  a  double  life 
even  now,  and  identifies  fame  with  our  own  better  exist- 
ence. There  is  no  subject,  however,  on  which  men  are 
so  apt  to  deceive  themselves  as  when  appealing  to  a 
higher  and  unseen  judgment :  probably  few  criminals  go 
to  execution  without  a  deceiving  belief  that  Heaven  will 
be  more  merciful  to  them  than  man  has  been,  because 
they  can  shelter  themselves  under  the  truth  that  Heaven 
alone  knows  what  their  difficulties  and  temptations  have 
been,  forgetting  that  it  alone  also  knows  their  oppor- 
tunities and  the  full  wickedness  of  their  life.  Every  man 
should  mistrust  himself  when  he  looks  forward  to  that 
higher  fame  with  any  other  feeling  than  one  of  having 
been  an  unprofitable  servant ;  and  even  this  feeling 
should  be  mistrusted  when  it  goes  into  words  rather  than 
to  the  springs  of  action.  It  is  in  the  general  idea,  and  as 
regards  others  rather  than  ourselves,  that  the  consola- 
tion of  Milton's  noble  lines  may  be  found.  The  dread 
severance  of  the  abhorred  shears  extends  not  merely  to 
the  lives  of  the  young  and  promising,  but  to  all  in  human 
life  which  is  beautiful  and  good.  What  avails  the  closest 
companionship,  the  fondest  love,  before  the  presence  of 
Death  the  separator  ?  In  even  an  ordinary  life,  how  many 
bright  promises  have  been  destroyed,  how  many  dearest 
ties  severed,  and  how  many  dark  regrets  remain  !  For 
that  there  is  no  consolation  worth  speaking  of  except  the 
faith  that  all  which  was  good  and  beautiful  here  below 
still  lives  and  blooms  above. 

There  are  several  very  beautiful   or  striking  places 


320  JTHE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

about  the  sources  of  the  Jhelam  which  no  visitor  to 
Kashmir  should  omit  to  see.  Islamabad  can  be  reached 
in  two  days  by  boat,  if  the  river  is  not  in  flood  ;  and  the 
mat  awning  of  the  boats  lets  down  close  to  the  gunwale, 
so  as  to  form  a  comfortable  closed  apartment  for  night. 
In  late  autumn,  at  least,  the  waters  of  Kashmir  are  so 
warm,  as  compared  with  the  evening  and  night  air,  that 
towards  afternoon  an  extraordinary  amount  of  steam 
begins  to  rise  from  them.  But  the  air  is  exceedingly 
dry  notwithstanding  the  immense  amount  of  water  in 
the  valley,  and  the  frequent  showers  of  rain  which  fall ; 
and  there  is  very  little  wind  in  Kashmir,  which  is  an 
immense  comfort,  especially  for  dwellers  in  tents.  There 
is  now  no  difficulty  in  obtaining  information  in  regard 
to  Kashmir  amply  sufficient  to  guide  the  visitor.  The 
older  books  on  that  country  are  well  enough  known,  such 
as  those  of  Bernier,  Jacquemont,  Moorcroft,  Hiigel,  and 
Vigne ;  and  it  is  curious  how  much  information  we  owe 
to  them,  and  how  repeatedly  that  information  has  been 
produced  by  later  writers,  apparently  without  any  at- 
tempt to  verify  it,  or  to  correct  it  up  to  date.  Three 
books  on  Kashmir,  however,  which  have  been  published 
very  recently,  will  be  found  of  great  use  to  the  traveller 
of  our  day.  First  and  foremost  of  these  is  "  A  Voca- 
bulary of  the  Kashmiri  Language,"  by  the  late  lamented 
medical  missionary,  Dr  W.  J.  Elmslie,  published  by  the 
Church  Missionary  House  in  London  in  1S72.  It  is  a 
small  volume,  and  gives  the  Kashmiri  for  a  great  num- 
ber of  English  words,  as  well  as  the  English  for  Kash- 
miri ones  ;  and  he  has  managed  to  compress  into  it  a 
large  amount  of  valuable  and  accurate  information  in 
regard  to  the  valley,  its  products  and  its  inhabitants. 
To  any  one  who  has  a  talent  for  languages,  or  who  has 
had  a  good  deal  of  experience  in  acquiring  them,  it  will 
be  found  a  very  easy  matter  to  learn   to   speak  a  little 


SCENES  IN  KA  SHMIR.  3  2 1 

modern  Kashmiri,  which  is  nearly  altogether  a  colloquial 
language  ;  and  for  this  purpose  Dr  Elmslie's  Vocabu- 
lary —  the  fruit  of  six  laborious  seasons  spent  in  the 
country — will  be  found  invaluable.  The  acquisition  of 
this  language  is  also  rendered  easy  by  its  relationship  to 
those  of  India  and  Persia.  The  largest  number  of  its 
words,  or  about  40  per  cent,  are  said  to  be  Persian; 
Sanscrit  gives  25;  Hindusthani,  15;  Arabic,  10;  and 
the  Turanian  dialects  of  Central  Asia,  15.  The  letters 
of  ancient  Kashmiri  closely  resemble  those  of  Sanscrit, 
and  are  read  only  by  a  very  few  of  the  Hindu  priests  in 
Kashmir;  and  it  is  from  these  that  the  Tibetan  charac- 
ters appear  to  have  been  taken.  The  second  important 
work  to  which  I  allude  has  not  been  published  at  all, 
having  been  prepared  "  for  political  and  military  refer- 
ence," for  the  use  of  the  Government  of  India.  It  is  "A 
Gazetteer  of  Kashmir  and  the  adjacent  districts  of  Kisht- 
war,  Badrawar,  Jamu,  Naoshera,  Punch,  and  the  Valley 
of  the  Kishen  Ganga,  by  Captain  Ellison  Bates,  Bengal 
Staff  Corps."  This  volume  was  printed  in  1873,  and 
will  be  found  very  useful  to  those  who  can  get  hold  of 
it.  The  principal  places  in  the  valley,  and  in  the  dis- 
tricts mentioned  above,  are  enumerated  alphabetically 
and  described  ;  and  there  are  nearly  150  pages  in  which 
routes  are  detailed  in  such  a  manner  that  the  traveller 
will  know  what  he  has  to  expect  upon  them.  It  has  also 
an  introduction,  which  contains  much  information  in  re- 
gard to  the  country  generally,  but  a  great  deal  of  this  has 
been  taken  from  the  older  writers,  and  some  of  it  does 
not  appear  to  have  been  verified.  In  this  respect  Dr 
Elmslie's  "Kashmiri  Vocabulary"  affords  more  original 
information  than  Captain  Bates's  Gazetteer,  but  the 
latter  will  be  found  a  very  valuable  work  of  reference. 
The  third  volume  I  speak  of  is  of  a  less  learned  de- 
scription, and  is  "  The  Kashmir  Handbook  :  a  Guide  for 

x 


322  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Visitors,  with  Map  and  Routes.  By  John  Ince,  M.D., 
Bengal  Medical  Service  ;  "  and  was  published  at  Cal- 
cutta in  1872.  This  work  is  not  free  from  errors,  as 
notably  in  its  rendering  of  the  Persian  inscriptions  on 
the  Takht-i-Suliman,  and  it  indiscriminately  heaps  to- 
gether a  good  deal  of  information  from  various  sources. 
It  is  also  very  costly  for  its  size,  and  the  arrangement  is 
not  very  good  ;  but,  nevertheless,  it  is  a  useful  guide- 
book. Armed  with  these  three  recently-published  vol- 
umes, the  visitor  to  Kashmir  is  supplied  with  all  the 
information  which  an  ordinary  traveller  requires  in  going 
through  a  strange  country  ;  but  their  maps  are  not  sat- 
isfactory, and  he  will  do  well  to  supply  himself  with 
the  five-mile-to-the-inch  sheets  of  the  Trigonometrical 
Survey.  The  antiquarian  may  consult  Cunningham's 
"Ancient  Geography  of  India,"  published  in  London  in 
1 87 1,  and  Lieutenant  Cole's  "Illustrations  of  Ancient 
Buildings  in  Kashmir."  For  the  sportsman,  there  are 
Brinkman's  "  Rifle  in  Kashmir,"  and  several  other  books, 
more  or  less  of  a  light  character.  Bernier,  the  first  of 
all  the  European  travellers  in  Kashmir  since  possibly 
Marco  Polo,  is  exceedingly  good  ;  Jacquemont's  Letters 
are  graphic  and  amusing,  though  full  of  insane  vanity ; 
and  Moorcroft  gathered  himself  much  more  information 
regarding  the  country  than  almost  any  other  traveller 
has  done,  for  Elmslie  may  almost  be  regarded  as  having 
been  a  resident. 

At  Pandrathan,  not  far  up  the  Jhelam  from  Srinagar, 
we  came  upon  the  site  of  an  ancient  capital  of  the 
Kashmir  valley,  and  on  a  very  ruinous  old  temple  situ- 
ated in  the  middle  of  a  tank,  or  rather  pond.  The  name 
of  this  place  affords  an  excellent  example  of  the  present 
state  of  our  knowledge  of  Kashmir  antiquities  ;  Dr  Ince, 
Captain  Bates,  and  Lieutenant  Cole,_ following  General 
Cunningham,  deriving  it  from  Puranadhisthana.  or  "  the 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  323 

old  chief  city  ;"  while  Dr  Elmslie,  adopting  its  Kashmir 
sound,  Pandrenton,  derives  it  from  Darendun  and  his 
five  sons  the  famous  Pandus.  Hiigel,  again,  made  the 
mistake  of  calling  it  a  Budhist  temple,  though  it  is  clearly- 
Hindu,  and  associated  with  the  Naga  or  snake  worship. 
The  water  round  this  temple  makes  an  examination  of 
the  interior  difficult ;  but  Captain  Bates  says  that  the 
roof  is  covered  with  sculpture  of  such  purely  classic  de- 
sign, that  any  uninitiated  person  who  saw  it  on  paper 
would  at  once  take  it  for  a  sketch  from  a  Greek  or 
Roman  original.  This  suggests  actual  Greek  influence  ; 
and  Cunningham  says,  in  connection  with  the  fluted 
columns,  porches,  and  pediments  of  Martand,  "  I  feel 
convinced  myself  that  several  of  the  Kashmirian  forms, 
and  many  of  the  details,  were  borrowed  from  the  tem- 
ples of  the  Kabulian  Greeks,  while  the  arrangements  of 
the  interior,  and  the  relative  proportions  of  the  different 
parts,  were  of  Hindu  origin."  It  is  not  improbable,  how- 
ever, that  these  Kashmir  ruins  may  have  belonged  to  an 
earlier  age,  and  have  had  an  influence  upon  Greek  archi- 
tecture instead  of  having  been  influenced  by  it ;  but  be 
that  as  it  may,  this  beautiful  little  temple,  with  its  pro- 
fusion of  decoration,  and  grey  with  antiquity,  stands 
alone,  a  curious  remnant  of  a  lost  city  and  a  bygone  age 
— the  city,  according  to  tradition,  having  been  burned 
by  King  Abhimanu  in  the  tenth  century  of  the  Chris- 
tian era. 

Camping  for  the  night  some  way  above  this,  and  on 
the  opposite  side  of  the  river,  I  saw  some  magnificent 
hunting-dogs  of  the  Maharajah,  which  bounded  on  their 
chains,  and  could  hardly  be  held  by  their  keepers,  on 
the  appearance  of  an  unaccustomed  figure.  They  were 
longer  and  higher  than  Tibetan  mastiffs,  and  had  some 
resemblance  in  hair  and  shape  to  Newfoundlands,  but 
were  mostly  of  a  brown  and  yellow  colour.     The  men 


324  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

in  charge  said  these  dogs  were  used  for  hunting  down 
large  game,  especially  leopards  and  wolves,  and  they 
were  certainly  formidable  creatures  ;  but  the  ordinary 
dogs  of  .Kashmir  are  very  poor  animals,  even  excluding 
the  pariahs.  Bates  says  that  the  wild  dog  exists  in 
some  parts  of  this  country,  as  Lar  and  Maru  Wardwari, 
hunts  in  packs,  and,  when  pressed  by  hunger,  will  destroy 
children,  and  even  grown  persons. 

At  Bijbehara,  immediately  above  which  the  Jhelam 
begins  to  narrow  considerably,  there  is  one  of  those 
numerous  and  exquisitely  picturesque-looking  Kashmir 
bridges,  resting  on  large  square  supports  formed  of  logs 
of  wood  laid  transversely,  with  trees  growing  out  of 
them,  and  overshadowi'ng  the  bridge  itself,  This  town 
has  400  houses  ;  and  the  following  analysis,  given  by 
Captain  Bates,  of  the  inhabitants  of  these  houses,  affords 
a  very  fair  idea  of  the  occupations  of  a  Kashmir  town  or 
large  village: — Mohammedan  zemindars  or  proprietors, 
80  houses;  Mohammedan  shopkeepers,  65  ;  Hindu  shop- 
keepers, 15  ;  Brahmins,  8;  pundits,  20  ;  goldsmiths,  10; 
bakers,  5  ;  washermen,  5  ;  clothweavers,  9;  blacksmiths, 
5  ;  carpenters,  4  ;  toy-makers,  I ;  surgeons  (query,  phle- 
botomists  ?),  2  ;  physicians,  3  ;  leather-workers,  5  ;  milk- 
sellers,  7  ;  cow-keepers,  2  ;  fishermen,  10;  fishsellers,  7; 
butchers,  8  ;  musicians,  2  ;  carpet-makers,  2  ;  blanket- 
makers,  3  ;  Syud  (descendant  of  the  prophet),  I  ;  Mullas 
(Mohammedan  clergymen),  12  ;  Pir  Zadas  (saints  !),  40  ; 
Fakirs,  20.  It  will  thus  be  seen  that  about  a  fourth  of 
the  400  houses  are  occupied  by  the  so-called  ministers 
of  religion  ;  and  that  the  landed  gentry  are  almost  all 
Mohammedan,  though  the  people  of  that  religion  com- 
plain of  their  diminished  position  under  the  present 
Hindu  (Sikh)  Raj  in  Kashmir.  For  these  400  houses 
there  are  10  mosques,  besides  8  smaller  shrines,  and 
several  Hindu  temples,  yet  the  Kashmiris  are  far  from 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  325 

being  a  religious  people  as  compared  with  the  races  of 
India  generally.  Let  us  consider  how  an  English  village 
of  4OCO  or  6000  people  would  flourish  if  it  were  burdened 
in  this  way  by  a  fourth  of  its  population  being  ministers 
of  religion,  and  in  great  part  ruffians  without  family  ties. 
It  is  a  very  rough  and  uncertain  calculation  which  sets 
down  the  population  of  Kashmir  at  half  a  million.  The 
whole  population  of  the  dominions  of  the  Maharajah  is 
said  to  be  a  million  and  a  half,  but  that  includes  Jamu, 
which  is  much  more  populous  than  Kashmir.  Captain 
Bates  says  that  the  estimate  of  the  Maharajah's  Govern- 
ment, founded  on  a  partial  census  taken  in  1869,  gave 
only  475,000  ;  but  that  is  better  than  the  population  of 
the  year  1835,  when  oppression,  pestilence,  and  famine 
had  reduced  it  so  low  as  200,OOC.  It  is,  however,  not 
for  want  of  producing  that  the  population  is  small  ;  for, 
according  to  the  same  authority,  "it  is  said  that  every 
woman  has,  at  an  average,  ten  to  fourteen  children."  I 
do  not  quite  understand  this  kind  of  average;  but  it 
seems  to  mean  that,  on  an  average,  every  woman  has 
twelve  children.  That  shows  a  prodigious  fecundity, 
and  is  the  more  remarkable  when  we  learn  that  the 
proportion  of  men  to  women  is  as  three  to  one.  This 
disproportion  is  produced  by  the  infamous  export  of 
young  girls  to  which  I  have  already  alluded  ;  and  it  is 
impossible  that  such  a  traffic  could  be  carried  on  with- 
out the  connivance  of  the  Government,  or  at  least  of 
a  very  large  number  of  the  Government  officials.  Dr 
Elmslie's  estimate  of  the  population  of  Kashmir,  includ- 
ing the  surrounding  countries  and  the  inhabitants  of  the 
mountains,  was  402,700 — of  these,  75,000  being  Hindus, 
312,700  being  Surf  Mohammedans,  and  15,000  Shias. 
His  estimate  of  the  population  of  Srinagar  was  127,000; 
but  the  census  of  the  Government  in  1869  gave  135,000 
for  that  city. 


326  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

At  night  our  boatmen  used  to  catch  fish  bv  holding- 
a  light  over  the  water  in  shallow  places,  and  transfixing 
the  fish  with  short  spears.  So  plentiful  are  these  crea- 
tures, that  between  two  and  three  dozen  were  caught  in 
about  half  an  hour,  and  many  of  them  above  a  pound 
weight.  I  cannot  say  much  of  them,  however,  as  articles 
of  diet.  The  flesh  was  insipid  and  soft  as  putty,  and 
they  were  as  full  of  bones  as  a  serpent.  Vigne  acutely 
observed  that  the  common  Himaiiyan  trout  varies  so 
much  in  colour  and  appearance,  according  to  its  age, 
season,  and  feeding-ground,  that  the  Kashmiris  have  no 
difficulty  in  making  out  that  there  are  several  species  of 
it  instead  of  one.  Bates  mentions  eleven  kinds  of  fish 
as  existent  in  the  waters  of  Kashmir;  but,  with  one  ex- 
ception, all  the  fish  I  had  the  fortune  to  see  seemed  of 
one  species,  and  were  the  same  in  appearance  as  those 
which  abound  in  prodigious  quantities  in  the  sacred 
tanks  and  the  ponds  in  the  gardens  of  the  Mogul  em- 
perors. The  exception  was  a  large  fish,  of  which  my 
servants  partook  on  our  way  to  the  Wular  Lake,  and 
which  made  them  violently  sick.  Elmslie  agrees  with 
Vigne  in  mentioning  only  six  varieties,  and  says  that 
the  Hindus  of  Kashmir,  as  well  as  the  Mohammedans, 
eat  fish.  Fly-fishing  is  pursued  by  the  visitors  to  this 
country,  but  the  fish  do  not  rise  readily  to  the  fly,  and 
Vigne  says  he  found  that  kind  of  fishing  to  be  an  un- 
profitable employment.  Much,  however,  depends  on 
the  streams  selected  for  this  purpose,  and  an  Angler's 
Guide  to  Kashmir  is  still  a  desideratum.  Dr  Ince  men- 
tions several  places  where  good  casts  are  to  be  had,  but 
otherwise  he  affords  Piscator  no  information. 

Islamabad  is  a  fine  name,  and  the  town  which  it 
denotes  is  the  terminus  of  the  navigation  of  the  upper 
Jhelam.  Boats  do  not  go  quite  up  to  it,  but  within  two 
or  three  miles  of  it,  and  th^re  ?,re  a  number  of  highly 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  327 

interesting  places  around  it  within  a  radius  of  thirty 
miles.  Though  the  second  town  in  the  province,  it  has 
only  about  1500  houses,  and  its  population  is  a  little 
doubtful,  as  the  statistician  leaves  us  at  liberty  to  cal- 
culate from  ten  to  thirty  inhabitants  to  the  house.  It 
lies  beneath  the  apex  of  the  tableland,  about  400  feet 
higher,  on  which  the  ruins  of  Martand  are  situated.  By 
the  Hindus  it  is  called  Anat  Nag ;  and  it  is  of  im- 
portance to  notice  the  number  of  Nags  there  are  in 
Kashmir  in  general,  and  in  this  part  of  the  country  in 
particular,  as  the  name  relates  to  the  old  serpent-worship 
of  the  country.  The  present  town  of  Islamabad  is  a 
miserable  place,  though  it  supports  no  less  than  fifteen 
Mohammedan  temples,  and  its  productions  are  shawls, 
saddle-cloths,  and  rugs.  At  the  Anat  Nag,  where  the 
sacred  tanks  are  alive  with  thousands  of  tame  fish,  there 
are  fine  plane-trees  and  a  large  double-storeyed  building 
for  respectable  travellers.  I  only  stopped  for  breakfast ; 
but  a  very  short  experience  of  the  interior  of  that  build- 
ing drove  me  out  into  a  summer-house  in  the  garden. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  if  the  fleas  in  the  larger  edifice 
were  at  all  unanimous,  they  could  easily  push  the 
traveller  out  of  bed.  The  water  of  the  sacred  tanks 
proceeds  from  springs,  and  is  slightly  sulphureous  in 
character,  which  does  not  appear  to  affect  the  health  of 
the  fish  ;  but  it  is  strictly  forbidden  to  kill  these  fish. 

At  Islamabad,  when  I  visited  it,  a  good  many  newly- 
plucked  crocus-flowers  were  in  course  of  being  dried  in 
order  to  make  saffron,  though  the  great  beds  of  this 
plant  are  further  down  the  Jhelam.  I  entirely  agree 
with  the  Emperor  Jehangir — the  man  who  would  let 
nobody  get  drunk  except  himself — when  he  says  in  his 
journal,  of  these  crocus-flowers,  "  Their  appearance  is 
best  at  a  distance,  and  when  plucked  they  emit  a  strong 
smell."      With  some  humour  Jehangir  goes  on  to  say, 


328  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

"  My  attendants  were  all  seized  with  a  headache  ;  and 
although  I  myself  was  intoxicated  with  liquor  at  the 
time,  I  also  felt  my  head  affected."  One  would  like  to 
know  how  the  Light  of  the  World  was  affected  on  this 
occasion,  but  history  is  silent;  and,  so  far  as  I  know, 
only  Tmolus  loved  to  adorn  his  head  with  crocus- 
flowers,  as  we  learn  from  the  first  Georgic  of  Virgil, 
56 — 

"  Nonne  vides  croceos  ut  Tmolus  odores, 
India  mittet  ebur,  molles  sua  thura  Sabad." 

Notwithstanding  their  odious  smell  when  fresh,  these 
saffron-flowers,  when  dried,  are  much  valued  as  condi- 
ment for  food,  as  medicine,  and  as  supplying  one  of  the 
colours  with  which  Hindus  make  some  of  their  caste- 
marks.  The  saffron  is  called  kong  in  the  Kashmiri 
language  ;  and,  according  to  Elmslie,  180  grains  of 
saffron — the  dried  stigmata  of  the  Crocus  sativus — bring 
nearly  a  shilling  in  the  valley  itself.  In  good  seasons, 
about  2000  traks  of  it  are  annually  produced  in  the  valley, 
and  a  trak  seems  to  be  equal  to  nearly  10  lbs.  English. 
October  is  the  season  for  collecting  the  flowers.  A  dry 
soil  is  said  to  be  necessary  to  the  growth  of  them  ;  and 
in  from  eight  to  twelve  years  they  exhaust  the  soil  so 
much,  that  eight  years  are  often  allowed  to  elapse  before 
"•rowing  it  again  on  the  exhausted  ground. 

The  garden  at  Islamabad  was  full  of  soldiers,  priests, 
and  beggars  ;  and  I  was  glad  to  move  on  five  miles  to 
Bawan,  on  the  Liddar,  where  there  is  a  similar  grove  and 
fish-ponds,  but  far  more  secluded,  and  with  more  magni- 
ficent trees.  This  is  a  delightful  place,  and  almost  no 
one  was  to  be  found  in  the  enclosure  round  the  tanks, 
which  are  held  specially  sacred.  On  the  way  thither  I 
passed  large  flocks  of  ponies  on  graze,  this  part  of 
Kashmir  being  famous  for  its  breed.  They  are  not  in 
in  any  respect,  except  size,  to   be    compared  with  the 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  329 

ponies  of  Tibet ;  but  they  are  tolerably  sure-footed,  and 
can  continue  pretty  long  daily  journeys.  At  Srinagar 
I  had  purchased,  for  my  own  use,  a  Khiva  horse,  from 
a  Panjabi  colonel  and  well-known  sportsman.  It  had 
been  brought  down  to  India  in  the  year  1872  by  the 
envoy  whom  the  Khan  of  Khiva  sent  to  Lord  North- 
brook  to  ask  for  assistance  against  the  Russians — a 
request  which  was  politely  but  firmly  declined.  This 
animal  was  of  an  iron-grey  colour,  with  immensely  thick, 
soft,  short  hair,  and  was  of  extraordinary  thickness  and 
length  in  the  body,  and  so  shaped  that  a  crupper  was 
required  to  keep  the  saddle  from  slipping  on  its 
shoulders.  Nothing  startled  it;  it  was  perfectly  sure- 
footed, and  could  go  long  journeys  among  the 
mountains  ;  but  though  it  had  been  shod,  its  feet  soon 
got  sore  when  I  rode  it  with  any  rapidity  along  the 
plains.  Its  favourite  pace  was  an  artificially  produced 
one,  which  consisted  chiefly  in  moving  the  two  feet  on 
one  side  simultaneously,  and  in  that  way,  which  was 
rather  an  easy  pace,  it  went  almost  as  fast  as  it  could 
trot  or  canter. 

The  caves  of  Bhumju,  in  a  limestone  cliff  near  to 
Bawan,  do  not  present  very  much  of  interest.  One  of 
them  penetrates  indefinitely  into  the  mountain,  and  the 
belief  is  that  it  goes  on  for  twenty  miles  at  least ;  but  it 
gets  so  narrow  and  low,  that  I  was  fain  to  come  to  a 
stop  after  going  about  200  paces  with  lighted  torches. 
Dr  Ince,  in  his  Kashmir  Handbook,  calls  it  the  Long 
Cave,  and  says  that  it  "  may  be  traversed  for  about  210 
feet ;  beyond  this  the  passage  becomes  too  small  to 
admit  a  man,  even  when  crawling,  so  that  its  total 
length  cannot  be  ascertained ;  the  natives,  however, 
believe  it  to  be  interminable.  It  is  the  abode  of 
numerous  bats,  and  the  rock  in  many  places  is  beau- 
tifully  honeycombed    by  the   action    of  water,    which 


330  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

is  constantly  trickling  from  the  higher  portions  of 
the  roof."  The  water  does  trickle  down  upon  one 
beautifully,  but  the  honeycombing  of  the  rock  is  the 
deposits  of  lime  made  by  the  water;  and  even  within 
the  200  feet  a  sense  of  pressure  is  experienced  from  the 
rock-walls.  Of  course  I  was  told  all  sorts  of  stories  as 
to  what  lies  beyond,  such  as  great  galleries,  halls, 
sculptures,  inscriptions,  rivers,  waterfalls,  evil  demons, 
gods,  goddesses,  and  so  forth.  All  this  sounded  very 
interesting  and  enticing  ;  but  worming  along  a  small 
aperture  is  by  no  means  suited  to  my  constitution  or 
tastes,  so  I  resisted  the  temptation,  and  said  to  myself, 
.'  Let  General  Cunningham*  creep  up  it  :  he  is  paid  for 
looking  after  the  archaeology  of  India."  About  fifty  feet 
from  the  entrance  of  this  passage,  and  opening  from 
the  left  of  it,  there  is  a  small  cave-temple.  In  a  still 
smaller  excavated  room  near  the  entrance  there  are  the 
bones  of  a  human  being  ;  but  skeletons  are  not  scarce  in 
Kashmir,  and  no  particular  antiquarian  interest  attaches 
to  these  remains.  Another  cave  in  the  immediate 
neighbourhood,  which  is  reached  by  ladders  and  very 
steep  stone  steps,  shows  more  traces  of  human  work- 
manship. This  is  called  the  Temple  Cave.  At  its 
entrance  there  is  a  fine  trefoil  arch,  and  on  one  of  the 
platforms  inside  there  is  what  Ince  speaks  of  as  "  a 
Hindu  temple  built  of  stone,  of  pyramidal  shape,  about 
1 1 \  feet  square,  and  one  of  the  most  perfect  specimens 
of  this  style  of  architecture  to  be  seen  in  any  part  of  the 
country."  I  examined  this  cave  rather  hurriedly,  and 
took  no  notes  concerning  it,  so  I  cannot  speak  with 
absolute  certainty  ;  but  my  recollection  of  this  Hindu 
temple  and  perfect  specimen  of  architecture  is,  that  it 
was  a  somewhat  ordinary  but  large  Lingam,  an  emblem 
which  need  not  be  explained  to  polite'readers. 

On  the  sides  of  the  bridle-path  from  these  caves  to 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  331 

the  tableland  above,  successive  lake  beaches  were  dis- 
tinctly visible.  Geology  leaves  no  doubt  as  to  the 
truth  of  the  old  tradition  that  the  great  valley  of 
Kashmir  was  once  a  magnificent  lake,  which  has  now 
subsided,  leaving  only  remnants  of  itself  here  and  there. 
The  name  of  this  ancient  lake  was  Sahtisar,  and  the 
mountains  surrounding  it  were  thickly  peopled.  The 
tradition  goes  on  to  say  that  the  lake  became  the  abode 
of  a  terrible  monster  called  Yaldeo,  who,  after  devouring 
all  the  fish  there  were  in  the  great  water,  proceeded  tc 
appease  his  hunger  by  devouring  the  inhabitants  of  the 
surrounding  hills,  who  in  consequence  had  to  fly  into 
the  higher  mountains  above.  At  this  stage  the  tradi- 
tional Rishi,  or  holy  man,  makes  his  appearance  on  the 
field  :  his  name  was  Kashaf,  and  his  great  sanctity  had 
given  him  the  power  of  working  miracles.  This  holy 
man  proceeded  to  the  north-west  end  of  the  lake,  where 
the  Jhelam  now  issues  from  the  valley  at  Baramula, 
struck  the  ground  with  his  trident,  and  the  opening 
earth  caused  the  waters  of  the  lake  to  disappear,  which 
soon  brought  about  the  death  of  the  monster  Yaldeo. 
Hence  the  name  Kashmir,  which  is  made  out  to  be 
a  contraction  of  Kashafmar,  the  place  or  country  of 
Kashaf  the  Rishi,  who  may  thus  be  said  to  have  made 
it.  As  to  the  truth  or  probability  of  this  story  about 
Kashaf,  I  need  say  nothing.  The  Hindu  may  turn 
round  upon  us  and  argue:  "You  say  the  age  of  miracles 
is  over,  and  you  can  show  no  modern  ones  in  support  of 
your  religion  more  probable  or  less  puerile  in  appear- 
ance than  those  which  the  masses  of  this  country  believe 
that  our  devotees  -still  accomplish.  As  the  age  of 
miracles  is  past  for  you,  so,  unhappily,  is  for  us  the 
age  for  the  incarnation  and  appearance  on  earth  of 
our  gods,  otherwise  you  would  not  be  here.  This 
we  have  long  been  taught,  and  see  abundant  reason  to 


332  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

believe,  is  the  Kala  Yogi,  or  Black  Age,  when  the  gods 
have  retired  from  the  earth  ;  but  that  does  not  prove 
they  have  never  been  here  before.  We  find  that  even 
the  rationalistic  Socrates  did  not  deny  the  actual  exist- 
ence of  the  gods  of  Greece ;  and  that,  in  an  age  of 
culture  and  criticism,  the  historian  Plutarch  thoroughly 
believed  in  them.  Is  the  universal  belief  of  whole 
nations,  and  of  hundreds  of  millions  of  people  for  tens 
of  centuries,  to  go  for  nothing  in  elucidation  and  proof 
of  the  past  history  of  the  human  race?  If  so,  what 
importance,  what  value,  can  we  attach  to  the  reasoning 
and  conclusions  of  a  {qw  Western  scientific  men  and 
critical  historians  who  have  formed  a  school  within  the 
last  century  ?  The  probability  would  be  that  they  too 
have  fallen  into  delusion,  and  are  blindly  leading  the 
blind.  It  is  more  rational  to  believe  that  the  gods 
of  ancient  Greece  and  India  really  existed,  as  at  the 
time  they  were  universally  believed  to  exist,  and  that 
they  are  now,  alas  1  passed  away  from  this  portion 
of  the  universe,  or  have  ceased  to  display  themselves  to 
the  degraded  human  race." 

Some  way  up  on  the  tableland,  in  a  now  lonely  and 
desolate  position,  which  commands  the  great  valley  of 
Kashmir,  I  found  the  wonderful  ruin  of  the  great  temple 
of  Martand.  Vigne  was  quite  justified  in  saying  that, 
"  as  an  isolated  ruin,  this  deserves,  on  account  of  its 
solitary  and  massive  grandeur,  to  be  ranked  not  only  as 
the  first  ruin  of  the  kind  in  Kashmir,  but  as  one  of  the 
noblest  amongst  the  architectural  relics  of  antiquity 
that  are  to  be  seen  in  any  country."  According  to 
tradition,  a  large  city  once  stood  round  it, — and  there 
are  indications  that  such  may  have  been  the  case, — but 
now  this  wonderful  ruin  stands  alone  in  solitary  un- 
relieved glory.  It  is  strange,  in  this  secluded  Eastern 
country,  where  the  works  of  man  are  generally  so  mean, 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  333 

and  surrounded  by  these  lofty  snowy  mountains,  to 
come  upon  a  ruin  which,  though  so  different  in  cha- 
racter, might  yet  vie  with  the  finest  remains  of  Greek 
and  Roman  architecture  in  its  noble  dimensions,  in  its 
striking  and  beautiful  form,  in  the  gigantic  stones  of 
which  it  is  composed,  in  its  imposing  position,  and  by 
the  manner  in  which  gloom  and  grandeur  are  softened 
by  its  exquisite  pillars,  and  its  delicate,  though  now 
half-defaced  ornamentation. 

This  temple  is  situated  within  an  oblong  colonnade 
composed  of  fluted  pillars  and  decaying  trefoil  arches 
and  walls.  It  rises  above  these  in  such  perfect  majesty, 
that  one  can  hardly  believe  its  present  height  is  only 
about  forty  feet.  Its  majestic  outlines  are  combined 
with  rich  and  elaborate  details;  but  a  description  of 
these,  or  even  of  its  outlines,  would  give  no  idea  of  its 
grand  general  effect,  while  desolation  and  silence  are 
around.  Moreover,  as  Captain  Bates  remarks,  "  It 
overlooks  the  finest  view  in  Kashmir,  and  perhaps  in 
the  known  world.  Beneath  it  lies  the  paradise  of  the 
East,  with  its  sacred  streams  and  glens,  its  brown 
orchards  and  green  fields,  surrounded  on  all  sides  by 
vast  snowy  mountains,  whose  lofty  peaks  seem  to  smile 
upon  the  beautiful  valley  below." 

Baron  Hugel  asserts  of  this  ancient  ruin,  which  he 
calls  by  its  name  of  Korau  Pandau,  or,  more  usually, 
Pandu-Koru,  that  it  "  owes  its  existence  and  name 
to  the  most  ancient  dynasty  of  Kashmir.  The  great 
antiquity  of  the  ruin  will  be  acknowledged,  therefore, 
when  I  remind  the  reader  that  the  Pandu  dynasty 
ended  2500  years  before  Christ,  after  governing  Kashmir, 
according  to  their  historians,  nearly  1300  years."  That 
would  give  an  antiq*uity  of  nearly  5000  years  to  this 
temple:  later  archaeologists,  however,  are  more  mode- 
rate   in    their    demands    upon    our    belief,    and   set    it 


334  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

down  as  erected  between  A.D.  370  and  500;  but  the 
reasons  for  this  are  by  no  means  conclusive.  When 
one  knows  nothing  about  the  history  of  an  ancient 
temple,  it  is  always  safe  to  call  it  a  temple  of  the  sun ; 
but  in  this  case  there  is  some  support  for  the  suppo- 
sition in  the  Sanscrit  meaning  of  the  word  Martand. 
That,  however,  does  not  throw  any  light  upon  its  age ; 
and  we  may  as  well  ascribe  it  to  the  Pandu  dynasty  as 
to  any  other  period  of  ancient  history.  Kashmir  may 
have  been  the  mountain-retreat  where  Pandu  himself 
died  before  his  five  sons  began  to  enact  the  scenes  of 
the  Mahabharata ;  but  modern  Indian  archaeologists 
have  got  into  a  way  of  constructing  serious  history  out 
of  very  slight  and  dubious  references.  This  is  not  to 
be  wondered  at,  because  the  first  synthetical  inquiries, 
as  conducted  by  Lassen  in  particular,  yielded  such 
magnificent  historical  results,  that  later  antiquaries 
have  been  under  a  natural  temptation  to  raise  startling 
edifices  out  of  much  more  slender  and  dubious  material. 
Hiigel's  date  is  quite  as  good  as  that  of  A.D.  370  ;  and 
where  all  is  pretty  much  speculation,  we  are  not  called 
upon  to  decide. 

But  sufficient  is  dimly  seen  in  the  mists  of  antiquity 
to  reveal  something  of  the  past,  as  we  stand  by  this 
ancient  temple  and  gaze  over  the  Valley  of  Roses.  A 
temple  such  as  Martand,  and  the  city  which  once 
stood  in  its  neighbourhood,  would  not,  in  all  proba- 
bility have  found  a  place  on  this  plateau  except  at  a 
period  when  the  Valley  was  a  great  lake.  Hence  we 
may  presume  that  this  temple  and  city  of  the  Pandus 
belonged  to  a  very  ancient  period,  when  the  inhabi- 
tants of  Kashmir  were  located  on  the  slopes  of  the 
mountains  round  a  great,  beautiful  lake,  more  pic- 
turesquely surrounded  than  any  sheet  of  water  now 
existing    upon    the    earth.      The    people    were    Indo- 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  335 

Aryans,  retaining  much  of  the  simplicity  and  rich, 
powerful  naturalness  of  the  Vedic  period,  but  civilised  in 
a  very  high  degree,  and  able  to  erect  splendid  temples 
to  the  Sun-god.  Associated  with  their  Aryan  religion 
they  indulged  in  the  serpent-worship  which  they  had 
adopted  from  more  primitive  races,  and  perhaps  from 
the  rude  Turanians  of  the'  neighbouring  abodes  of 
snow.  In  these  ancient  times  the  people  and  rulers  of 
Kashmir  would  be  very  effectually  secluded  from  ag- 
gressive forces.  No  rapacious  neighbours  would  be 
strong  enough  to  disturb  their  family  nationality  ;  and 
in  their  splendid  climate,  with  a  beautiful  lake  con- 
necting their  various  settlements,  it  is  far  from  unlikely 
that  the  Aryans  in  Kashmir  may  have  presented  a 
powerful,  natural,  and  art-loving  development,  analo- 
gous to  that  which,  about  the  same  period,  they  were 
beginning  to  obtain  in  the  favoured  Isles  of  Greece. 
But,  whether  produced  by  natural  or  artificial  causes — 
whether  due  to  P'ate,  or  to  a  shortsighted  desire  for 
land — the  disappearance  of  the  lake  and  the  desiccation 
of  the  valley,  which  tradition  assigns  to  the  year  266 
B.C.,  must  have  wrought  a  great  change  in  their  circum- 
stances, associated  as  it  was  with  the  increase  of  the 
warlike  mountain-tribes  around.  Gradually  the  valley- 
plain  would  afford  a  more  fertile  and  easily-worked  soil 
than  the  slopes  of  the  mountains,  which  were  soon  for- 
saken for  it.  The  primitive  serpent-worship  and  the 
natural  Vedic  religion  would  be  affected  by  the  evil 
Brahminism  of  the  plains  of  India;  and  this,  again,  had 
to  struggle  against  the  rising  influence  of  Budhism, 
which  is  unfavourable  to  warlike  qualities.  Tartar 
chiefs  began  to  dispute  the  kingdom  with  Hindi!  dynas- 
ties ;  fierce  mountaineers  in  the  Hindu  Kush  would 
greedily  listen  to  rumours  about  the  terrestrial  para- 
dise, and    there   would  be  the  commencement  of  that 


336  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

state  of  hopeless  vassalage  which  has  condemned 
the  Kashmiri  to  centuries  of  misery,  and  ^developed 
in  his  character  its  falsity  and  feebleness.  Nothing- 
more  definite  can  be  discerned  of  that  early  period 
except  that  the  Kashmiris  were  a  brave  and  warlike 
people  ;  and  that,  even  then,  its  women  were  famous 
for  their  beauty,  as  illustrated  by  the  legend  of  the 
two  angels  Harat  and  Marat,  who  were  sent  on  earth 
by  God  to  reform  men  by  their  example,  but  were 
ensnared  by  the  beauty  of  a  fair  Kashmiri.  Other 
countries  are  not  without  stories  of  the  kind  ;  but  to 
Kashmir  it  was  reserved  to  corrupt  the  reforming  angels 
by  means  of  a  simple  courtesan.  Mermaids,  too, 
there  appear  to  have  been  in  the  lake — the  beau- 
tiful daughters  of  the  serpent-gods,  before  whom  even 
Brahmins  trembled  and  were  powerless.  With  the 
Mohammedans  there  comes  a  more  troubled  era.  After 
an  ineffectual  attempt  in  the  end  of  the  tenth  century, 
Mohammed  of  Ghuzni  conquered  Kashmir  in  the  begin- 
ning of  the  eleventh  century  ;  chiefs  of  Dardistan  and 
kings  of  Tibet  make  incursions  into  it,  and  forcibly 
marry  the  daughters  of  its  tottering  Hindu  monarchs  ; 
even  distant  Turkistan  sends  vultures  to  the  prey  ; 
and  the  only  heroism  is  displayed  by  Queen  Rajputani, 
the  last  of  its  Hindu  sovereigns,  who  rather  than  marry 
an  usurping  prime  minister,  upbraided  him  for  his  in- 
gratitude and  treachery,  and  stabbed  herself  before 
him.  The  sixth  of  the  Moslem  monarchs,  who  suc- 
ceeded and  who  reigned  in  1396  A.D.,  was  the  igno- 
rant zealot  Sikander,  nicknamed  Bhutshikan  or  the 
Image-breaker,  who  devoted  his  energies  to  destroy- 
ing the  ancient  architecture  and  sculpture  of  Kashmir, 
and  succeeded  only  too  well  in  his  endeavours.  In 
the  next  century  reigned  the  Badshah  or  Great  King, 


SCENES  IN  KASHMIR.  337 

Zein-ul-abdin,  who  gave  Kashmir  its  most  celebrated 
manufacture,  by  introducing  wool  from  Tibet  and  wea- 
vers from  Turkistan,  as  also  papier-mache  work  and 
the  manufacture  of  paper.  This  extraordinary  man 
reigned  fifty-three  years  ;  he  was  a  patron  of  litera- 
ture, a  poet  and  a  lover  of  field-sports,  as  well  as  a  most 
practical  ruler,  and  he  gave  the  country  a  great  impetus. 
This  vantage-ground,  however,  was  lost  almost  immedi- 
ately after  his  death,  and,  as  he  had  foreseen,  by  the 
growing  power  of  the  native  class  of  the  Chaks,  who 
soon  rose  to  supreme  power  in  Kashmir  by  placing  them- 
selves at  the  head  of  the  national  party.  Under  one  of 
their  chiefs  the  valley  asserted  itself  nobly  and  victori- 
ously against  its  external  enemies;  but  this  advantage 
was  soon  lost  through  internal  jealousies,  enmities,  and 
treachery  ;  and  a  request  for  assistance  offered  by  one 
of  the  Chdk  chiefs  afforded  Akbar  the  pretext  for  con- 
quering the  country  and  making  it  a  part  of  the  great 
Mogul  Empire. 

On  the  way  from  Martand  to  Achibal  I  saw  the  only 
serpent  which  appeared  before  me  in  Kashmir ;  but  be- 
fore I  could  get  hold  of  it,  the  wily  creature  had  disap- 
peared in  the  grass  ;  and  those  who  have  closely  observed 
serpents  know  how  readily  they  do  disappear,  and  how 
wonderfully  the  more  innocuous  ones,  even  the  large 
rock-snakes,  manage  to  conceal  themselves  from  the 
human  eye  in  short  grass,  where  it  might  be  thought  that 
even  a  small  snake  could  easily  be  detected.  I  have 
been  instructed  by  Indian  snake-charmers,  who  are 
rather  averse  to  parting  with  their  peculiar  knowledge, 
and  have  tried  my  hand  successfully  on  a  small  wild 
cobra,  between  three  and  four  feet  in  length,  so  I  speak 
with  knowledge  and  experience  on  this  subject  ;  but  this 
Kashmir  snake  I  refer  to  eluded  my  grasp.  It  was 
only  about  two  and  a  half  or  three  feet  long,  and  had 


338  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

the  appearance  of  a  viper;  but  I  do  not  know  what  it 
was.  The  ganas,  or  apliia,  is  a  species  of  viper  which  is 
said  to  be  very  dangerous,  and  is  most  dreaded  by  the 
people  of  the  country.  The  latter  name  has  suggested, 
and  very  properly  suggests,  the  6'<£t9  of  the  Greeks. 
Serpents  are  scarce  in  Kashmir,  and  do  not  at  all  in- 
terfere with  the  great  pleasure  of  camping  out  in  that 
country.  There  is  more  annoyance  from  leopards,  espe- 
cially for  people  who  have  small  dogs  with  them  ;  for  the 
leopard  has  quite  a  mania  for  that  sort  of  diet,  and  will 
not  hesitate  to  penetrate  into  your  tent  at  night  in  quest 
of  his  game. 

Achibal  and  Vernag  are  two  delightful  places,  such 
as  no  other  country  in  the  world  can  present;  but  their 
general  characteristics  are  so  similar  that  I  shall  not 
attempt  to  describe  them  separately.  They  resemble 
the  Shalimar  and  Nishat  Gardens,  to  which  I  have 
already  alluded,  but  are  more  secluded,  more  beautiful, 
and  more  poetic.  Bal  means  a  place,  and  Ash  is  the 
satyr  of  Kashmir  traditions.  Ver,  according  to  Elmslie, 
is  the  name  of  the  district  in  which  the  summer  palace 
is  situated  ;  but  it  is  properly  vir,  which  may  be  either 
the  Kashmir  word  for  the  weeping  willow  (which  would 
suit  it  well  enough),  or  an  old  Aryan  form  for  the  Latin 
vir.  On  the  latter  supposition  it  would  be  the  haunt  of 
the  man-serpents,  and  it  is  exactly  the  place  that  would 
have  suited  them  in  ancient  or  any  times. 

Both  Achibal  and  Vernag  were  favourite  haunts  of 
our  friend  Jehangi'r,  and  of  his  wife  Nur  Jahan,  the  Light 
of  the  World.  If  that  immortal  pair  required  any  proof 
of  their  superiority,  it  would  be  found  in  the  retreats 
which  they  chose  for  themselves,  and  which  mark  them 
out  as  above  the  level  of  ordinary  and  even  royal 
humanity.  At  Achibal,  a  spring  of  water,  the  largest 
in  Kashmir,  rises  at  the  head  of  the  beautiful  pleasure- 


SCENES  JN  KASHMIR.  339 

garden,  underneath  an  overshadowing  cliff,  and  this  is 
supposed  to  be  the  reappearance  of  a  river  which  dis- 
appears in  the  mountains  some  miles  above.  At  Ver- 
nag,  also,  a  large  spring  bubbles  up  in  almost  icy  coldness 
beneath  a  gigantic  cliff,  fringed  with  birch  and  light  ash, 
that— 

"  Pendant  from  the  brow 
Of  yon  dim  cave,  in  seeming  silence  make 
A  soft  eye-music  of  slow- waving  boughs." 

It  is  more  specially  interesting,  however,  as  the  source 
of  the  Jhelam  or  Hydaspes;  and  as  I  sat  beside  it  on  an 
evening  of  delicious  repose,  an  old  schoolboy  recollec- 
tion came  to  mind,  and  it  was  pleasant  to  find  that,  if  I 
could  not  venture  to  claim  entirely  the 

"  Integer  vitae  scelerisque  purus," 

yet  I  had  escaped  the  Maurian  darts,  and  had  been  en- 
abled to  travel  in  safety — 

-*'  Sive  per  Syrtes  iter  asstuosas, 
Sive  facturus  per  inhospitalem 
Caucasum,  vel  quoe  loca  fabulostu 
Lambit  Hydaspes." 


CHAPTER  X. 

THE   AFGHAN   BORDER. 

BEFORE  leaving  Kashmir  I  must  devote  a  paragraph  to 
its  two  most  famous  sheets  of  water,  the  Manasbal,  and 
the  Wiilar  Lake.  They  are  both  on  the  usual  way  out 
from  Srinagar,  which  is  also  the  usual  way  to  it,  and  are 
seen  by  most  visitors  to  the  valley. 

The  Manasbal  is  called  the  most  beautiful,  but  is 
rather  the  most  picturesque,  lake  in  Kashmir.  It  lies 
close  to  the  Jhelam  on  the  north-west,  and  is  connected 
with  that  river  by  a  canal  only  about  a  mile  long,  through 
which  boats  can  pass.  This  little  lake  is  not  much  larger 
than  Grasmere,  being  scarcely  three  miles  long  by  one 
broad  ;  but  its  shores  are  singularly  suggestive  of  peace- 
fulness  and  solitude.  Picturesque  mountains  stand  round 
a  considerable  portion  of  it,  and  at  one  point  near  they 
rise  to  the  height  of  10,000  feet,  while  snowy  summits 
are  visible  beyond.  In  its  clear  deep-green  water  the 
surrounding  scenery  is  seen  most  beautifully  imaged. 
There  being  so  little  wind  in  Kashmir,  and  the  surround- 
ing trees  and  mountains  being  so  high,  this  is  one  of  the 
most  charming  features  of  its  placid  lakes.  Wordsworth 
has  assigned  the  occasional  calmness  of  its  waters  as 
one  of  the  reasons  why  he  claims  that  the  Lake  Country 
of  England  is  more  beautiful  than  Switzerland,  where 
the  lakes  are  seldom  seen  in  an  unruffled  state;  but  in 
this  respect  the  Valley  of  Roses  far  surpasses  our  Eng- 
lish district,  for  its  lakes  are  habitually  calm  :  for  hours 
at  a  time  they  present  an  almost  absolute  stillness  ;  they 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  341 

are  beautifully  clear,  and  the  mountains  around  them  are 
not  only  of  great  height  and  picturesque  shape,  but, 
except  in  the  height  of  summer,  are  half  covered  with 
snow  ;  the  clouds  are  of  a  more  dazzling  whiteness  than 
in  England,  and  the  sky  is  of  a  deeper  blue.  There,  most 
emphatically,  if  I  may  be  allowed  slightly  to  alter 
Wordsworth's  lines — 

"  The  visible  scene 
May  enter  unawares  into  the  mind, 
With  all  its  solemn  imagery,  its  woods, 
Its  snow,  and  that  divinest  heaven  received 
Into  the  bosom  of  the  placid  lake." 

The  poet  just  quoted  has  tried  to  explain  the  singular 
effect  upon  the  mind  of  such  mirrored  scenes  by  saying, 
that  "the  imagination  by  their  aid  is  carried  into  recesses 
of  feeling  otherwise  impenetrable."  And  he  goes  on  to 
explain  that  the  reason  for  this  is,  that  "  the  heavens  are 
not  only  brought  down  into  the  bosom  of  the  earth,  but 
that  the  earth  is  mainly  looked  at  and  thought  of  through 
the  medium  of  a  purer  element.  The  happiest  time  is 
when  the  equinoctial  gales  have  departed  ;  but  their  fury 
may  probably  be  called  to  mind  by  the  sight  of  a  (qw 
shattered  boughs,  whose  leaves  do  not  differ  in  colour 
from  the  faded  foliage  of  the  stately  oaks  from  which 
these  relics  of  the  storm  depend  :  all  else  speaks  of 
tranquillity  ;  not  a  breath  of  air,  no  restlessness  of  insects, 
and  not  a  moving  object  perceptible,  except  the  clouds 
gliding  in  the  depths  of  the  lake,  or  the  traveller  passing 
along,  an  inverted  image,  whose  motion  seems  governed 
by  the  quiet  of  a  time  to  which  its  archetype,  the  living 
person,  is  perhaps  insensible:  or  it  may  happen  that  the 
figure  of  one  of  the  larger  birds,  a  raven  or  a  heron,  is 
crossing  silently  among  the  reflected  clouds,  while  the 
noise  of  the  real  bird,  from  the  element  aloft,  gently 
awakens  in  the  spectator  the  recollection  of  appetites 


342  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

and  instincts,  pursuits  and  occupations,  that  deform 
and  agitate  the  world,  yet  have  no  power  to  prevent 
nature  from  putting  on  an  aspect  capable  of  satisfying 
the  most  intense  cravings  for  the  tranquil,  the  lovely, 
and  the  perfect,  to  which  man,  the  noblest  of  her  creatures, 
is  subject."  But  the  reasons  thus  suggested,  rather  than 
explicitly  pointed  out,  are  scarcely  sufficient  to  explain 
the  singular  charm  of  a  beautiful  upland  and  cloudland 
scene  reflected  in  a  deep,  calm,  clear  lake.  Its  most 
powerful  suggestion  is  that  of  an  under-world  into  which 
all  thing's  beautiful  must  pass,  and  where  there  is  re- 
served for  them  a  tranquillity  and  permanence  unknown 
on  earth.  We  seem  to  look  into  that  under- world ;  the 
beauty  of  the  earth  appears  under  other  conditions  than 
those  of  our  upper  world  ;  and  we  seem  to  catch  a 
glimpse  of  the  abiding  forms  of  life,  and  of  a  more 
spiritual  existence  into  which  we  ourselves  may  pass,  yet 
one  that  will  not  be  altogether  strange  to  us.  Some 
of  our  latest  speculators  have  attempted  to  prove  the 
existence  of  such  a  world  even  from  the  admitted  facts 
of  physical  science  ;  and  in  all  ages  it  has  been  the 
dream  of  poetry  and  the  hope  of  religion  that  beyond 
the  grave,  and  perhaps  beyond  countless  ages  of  pheno- 
menal existence,  or  separated  from  us  only  by  the  veil 
of  mortality,  there  is  another  and  more  perfect  form  of 
life — "the  pure,  eternal,  and  unchangeable"  of  Plato  as 
well  as  of  Christianity.  No  argument  can  be  drawn  in 
favour  of  such  views  from  the  under-world  of  a  placid 
lake;  but  the  contemplation  of  it  is  suggestive,  and  is 
favourable  to  that  mood  of  mind  in  which  we  long  and 
hope  for  a  land  where 

*'Ever  pure  and  mirror-bright  and  even, 
Life  amidst  the  immortals  glides  away ; 
Moons  are  waning,  generations  changing, 
Their  celestial  life  blooms  everlasting, 
Changeless  'mid  a  ruined  world's  decay." 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  343 

The  Wular  is  the  largest  remnant  of  that  great  lake 
which  once  filled  the  Vale  of  Kashmir,  and  it  too  must 
disappear  ere  any  long  period  of  time  elapses.  Captain 
Bates  says  correctly  that  it  "  is  a  lake  simply  because  its 
bottom  is  lower  than  the  bed  of  the  Jhelam  ;  it  will  dis- 
appear by  degrees  as  the  bed  of  the  pass  at  Baramula 
becomes  more  worn  away  by  the  river  ;  its  extent  is 
perceptibly  becoming  more  circumscribed  by  the  depo- 
sition of  soil  and  detritus  on  its  margin."  This  is  not 
at  all  unlikely,  as  the  average  depth  is  only  about  twelve 
feet.  Its  greatest  length  is  twelve  miles,  and  its  greatest 
breadth  ten,  so  that  it  is  by  no  means  so  grand  a  sheet 
of  water  as  that  of  Geneva  ;  but  there  is  something  in 
its  character  which  reminds  one  of  Lake  Leman,  and 
arises  probably  from  the  stretch  of  water  which  it  pre- 
sents, and  the  combined  softness  and  grandeur  of  the 
scenery  around.  Lofty  mountains  rise  almost  imme- 
diately from  its  northern  and  eastern  sides  ;  but  there  is 
room  all  round  the  lake  for  the  innumerable  villages 
which  enliven  its  shore.  Calm  as  it  usually  is,  furious 
storms  often  play  upon  its  surface,  and  in  one  of  these 
Ranjit  Singh  lost  300  of  the  boats  carrying  his  retinue 
and  effects.  In  the  beginning  of  spring  some  of  the 
wildfowl  of  this  and  the  other  lakes  of  Kashmir  take 
flight  to  the  distant  valleys  ofYarkund  and  Kashgar  ; 
and,  in  connection  with  that  migration,  the  Kashmiris 
have  a  very  curious  story.  They  say  that  the  birds,  being 
aware  of  the  difficulty  of  finding  food  in  the  streams 
of  Tibet,  which  have  only  stony  banks  and  beds,  take 
with  them  a  supply  of  the  singJiara,  or  water-nut  of 
Kashmir,  for  food  on  their  journey.  Such  forethought 
is  rare  among  the  lower  creation.  I  once,  however,  had 
a  large  dog,  which,  when  it  saw  me  ready  to  start  on  a 
journey,  would  try  and  get  hold  of  a  bone  or  something 
of  the  kind,  and  take  that  down  with  it  to  the  railway, 


344  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

in  order  to  relieve  the  tedium  of  confinement  in  the 
dog-box;  and,  of  course,  animals  bring  "food  to  their 
young. 

At  Baramula  I  took  leave  of  the  great  valley  of  Kash- 
mir. From  thence  a  path  leads  up  to  the  mountain- 
town  of  Gulmarg,  the  most  favourite  of  the  sanitariums 
of  Kashmir,  and  from  whence  a  splendid  view  may  be 
obtained  of  the  wonderful  26,000-feet  peak  of  Nangha 
Parbat,  which  rises  about  a  hundred  miles  to  the  north, 
between  the  districts  of  Chilas  and  Astor.  Immediately 
below  Baramula,  and  after  leaving  the  great  valley,  the 
Jhelam  changes  its  character,  and  becomes  a  swift, 
furious  river,  on  which  boats  cannot  be  used  at  all, 
except  at  one  or  two  calmer  places,  where  they  are  used 
for  ferries,  being  attached  by  ropes  to  the  bank.  Along 
these  are  paths  on  both  sides  of  the  river,  but  that  on 
the  left  or  southern  bank  is  much  preferable,  both  be- 
cause the  bridle-road  is  better,  and  it  is  much  more 
shaded.  Seven  easy  marches  took  me  to  the  town  of 
Mozafarabad,  and  I  did  not  enjoy  that  part  of  my  jour- 
ney the  less  that  I  have  almost  nothing  to  say  about  it. 
The  scenery  is  most  beautiful,  and  fills  the  mind  with  a 
sense  of  calm  pleasure.  Though  the  valley  is  narrow,  it 
is  thickly  wooded,  and  the  dark  forest  glades  spread  out, 
here  and  there,  into  more  open  spaces,  with  green  mea- 
dows. Great  black  precipices  alternate  with  wooded 
slopes  ;  there  are  beautiful  halting-places  under  immense 
trees,  and  the  path  often  descends  into  dark  cool  gorges, 
where  there  are  picturesque  bridges  over  the  foaming 
mountain  streams.  It  must  be  delightful  to  come  on 
this  Jhelam  valley  in  April  or  May  from  the  burned-up 
plains  of  India,  and  it  might  revive  even  a  dying  man. 
Among  the  trees  there  were  flocks  of  monkeys,  which 
drove  my  Tibetan  dogs  frantic  ;  and  bears  are  to  be 
found   in   the  wild   mountain  valleys  which   branch   off 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  345 

from  this  larger  valley.  The  rest-houses  erected  by  the 
Maharajah  of  Kashmir  were  not  free  from  insects,  espe- 
cially fleas,  and  the  bridle-path  went  up  and  down  more 
than  was  strictly  necessary  ;  but  I  hear  better  houses 
have  been  erected,  or  are  in  course  of  erection,  and  the 
road  is  being  improved.  As  no  charge  was  made  for 
stopping  in  the  rest-houses,  one  could  not  complain 
of  them  ;  but  the  new  houses  are  to  be  charged  for, 
like  travellers'  bungalows  in  British  India.  At  one  of 
the  wildest  parts  of  the  river,  a  Kashmiri  said  to  me, 
"  Decco,"  or,  "  Look  here,  Sahib  !  "  and  plunged  from  a 
high  rock  into  the  foaming  stream.  The  most  obvious 
conclusion  was  that  he  had  found  life  and  the  Maha- 
rajah's officers  too  much  for  him  ;  but  he  reappeared  a 
long  way  down,  tossed  about  by  the  river,  and  displayed 
the  most  wonderful  swimming  I  have  ever  seen. 

Mpzafarabad  is  in  the  corner  of  the  junction  between 
the  Jhelam  and  the  Kishen  Ganga,  or  the  river  Krishna. 
The  valley  of  the  latter  stream  is,  for  the  most  part,  a 
mere  chasm  among  the  mountains,  and  some  of  its 
scenery  is  said  to  be  exceedingly  wild  and  beautiful. 
Mozafarabad  is  an  important  town,  with  about  twelve 
hundred  families,  and  a  large  fort,  and  stands  on  the  last 
and  lowest  ridge  of  the  mountains  which  form  the  water- 
shed between  the  two  rivers.  Here  I  left  the  road, 
which  takes  on  to  the  hill-station  of  Mari  and  to  the 
Panjab  plains  at  Rawal  Pindi,  and  crossed  the  Kishen 
Ganga,  as  well  as  the  Jhelam,  in  order  to  proceed  to 
Abbotabad  and  the  Afghan  border. 

Thus  I  have  now  to  enter  upon  an  entirely  different 
district  of  country  from  any  I  have  yet  described  in 
these  chapters.  We  have  to  go  along  the  base  of  the 
Hindu  Kush,  below  mountains  into  which  the  English 
traveller  is  not  allowed  to  enter,  and  which  are  peopled 
by  hardy  warlike  •mountaineers,  very  different  in  charac- 


346  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

ter  from  the  placid  Tibetans  and  effeminate  Kashmiris. 
The  first  district  through  which  I  have  to  pass  is  called 
the  Hazara,  and  extends  from  near  Mozafarabad  to  the 
Indus  where  it  issues  from  the  Hindu  Kush  ;  the  second 
is  the  Yusufzai  district,  which  occupies  the  triangle 
formed  by  the  Indus,  the  Kaubul  river,  and  the  moun- 
tains just  referred  to  ;  and  beyond  these  districts  I  have 
only  to  speak  of  Peshawar,  and  of  an  excursion  a  short 
way  up  the  famous  Khyber  Pass.  All  that  border  has 
seen  a  great  deal  of  fighting  by  British  troops — and 
fighting  without  end  before  any  British  appeared  on  the 
scene,  or  even  existed  ;  and  even  before  Alexander  the 
Great  took  the  rock-fortress  of  Aornos,  which  we  have 
to  visit  under  guard  of  Afghan  chiefs  and  horsemen  in 
chain-armour. 

Mozafarabad  is  only  2470  feet  high,  and  a  steep 
mountain  ridge  separates  it  from  the  more  elevated 
valley  of  the  Kunhar  river,  which  is  inhabited  by 
Afghans  who  are  under  the  dominion  of  Great  Britain. 
On  passing  from  the  Kashmir  to  the  English  border, 
I  found  an  excellent  path,  on  which  mountain-guns 
might  easily  be  carried,  and  descended  on  the  village 
of  Gurhi  Hubli,  where  large-bodied,  often  fair-com- 
plexioned,  Afghans  filled  the  streets.  This  place  is 
too  close  to  the  border  of  Afghanistan  to  be  altogether 
a  safe  retreat ;  but  there  are  a  large  number  of  armed 
policemen  about  it.  Scorn  me  not,  romantic  reader,  if 
my  chief  association  connected  with  it  is  that  of  the 
intense  pleasure  of  finding  myself  in  a  travellers'  bun- 
galow once  more.  Our  estimate  of  these  much-abused 
edifices  depends  very  much  on  the  side  we  take  them 
from.  After  having  snow  for  the  carpet  of  your  tent, 
and  visits  at  night  from  huge  Tibetan  bears,  there  is 
some  satisfaction  in  finding  yourself  quite  safe  from 
everything  except  some  contemptible  rat  or  a  (compara- 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  347 

tively)  harmless  grey  scorpion.  There  is  also  comfort 
in  being  free  from  the  insects  of  the  Kashmir  rest- 
houses.  People  who  have  never  lived  in  anything  but 
houses  must  lose  half  the  pleasure  of  living  in  a  house. 
How  the  first  man  who  made  a  dwelling  for  himself 
must  have  gloated  over  his  wretched  contrivance,  until 
some  stronger  man  came  and  took  possession  of  it ! 
But  the  bungalows  of  the  Hazara  district  are  particu- 
larly well  built  and  luxurious,  just  as  if  distinguished 
travellers  were  constantly  in  the  habit  of  visiting  that 
extremely  out-of-the-way  part  of  the  world ;  and  their 
lofty  rooms  afforded  most  grateful  coolness  and  shade; 
while  my  wearied  servants  were  delighted  to  remit  the 
business  of  cooking  for  me  to  the  Government  klian- 
samah,  while  reserving  to  themselves  the  right  and  plea- 
sure of  severely  criticising  his  operations  and  tendering 
to  him  any  amount  of  advice. 

The  next  day  took  me  along  a  beautiful  road  over 
another  but  a  low  mountain  pass,  and  winding  among 
hills  which  were  thickly  covered  with  pines  and  cedars. 
The  forest  here  was-truly  magnificent,  and  perfect  still- 
ness reigned  under  its  shade.  Emerging  from  that,  I 
came  down  on  the  broad  Pukli  vailey,  on  the  other  side 
of  which,  but  at  some  distance,  were  visible  the  wooded 
heights  of  the  Mataban,  or  Black  Mountain,  which  was 
the  scene  of  one  of  the  most  bloodless  of  our  hill- 
campaigns.  I  stopped  that  night  of  the  4th  November 
at  Mansera,  and  witnessed  a  total  eclipse  of  the  moon, 
which  was  then  at  the  full.  This  seemed  to  cause  a 
good  deal  of  consternation  among  the  people  of  the 
village,  and  they  moaned  and  wailed  as  if  the  heavens 
and  the  earth  were  in  danger  of  passing  away. 

Another  day  took  me  to  Abbotabad,  which  is  a  con- 
siderable military  station,  and  commands  a  large  portion 
of  the  frontier.     It  is  4166  feet  high,  and  being  a  little 


348  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

above  the  thirty-fourth  degree  of  north  latitude,  it  has  a 
cool  and  fine  climate.  A  good  deal  of  rain  fell  during 
the  few  days  that  I  was  there,  and  the  air  felt  very  much 
like  that  of  a  wet  English  September  or  October ;  while 
the  church  and  the  character  of  the  houses  gave  the  place 
quite  an  English  look.  Rising  close  above  it,  at  the 
height  of  9000  feet,  there  is. the  sanitarium  of  Tandiani, 
which  can  easily  be  reached  in  a  very  few  hours,  so  that 
the  officers  stationed  at  this  place  are  particularly  fortu- 
nate. I  wonder  it  is  not  more  taken  advantage  of  for 
European  troops.  Not  even  excepting  artillerymen,  all 
the  troops  there  were  Goorkhas,  Panjabis,  or  Hindii- 
sthanis ;  but  no  doubt  there  are  military  reasons  for 
this,  Abbotabad  being  so  far  from  any  railway:  but  it 
stands  to  reason  that  an  important  frontier  station  of  this 
kind  would  be  much  the  better  of  an  English  force. 

Anglo-Indian  society  shows  to  advantage  in  these 
secluded  military  stations,  and  I  was  at  once  made  to 
feel  quite  at  home  by  the  officers  and  their  families  at 
Abbotabad.  I  had  the  advantage,  too,  of  being  the 
guest  of  General  Keyes,  an  officer  who  distinguished 
himself  greatly  in  the  Umbeyla  campaign,  in  which  he 
was  wounded,  and  who  commanded  the  whole  of  the 
frontier  forces,  from  Kashmir  round  the  northern  border 
to  Peshawar,  and  from  Peshawar,  excluding  the  district 
of  that  name,  down  to  Dehra  Ghazi  Khan,  a  little  below 
Multan.  This,  of  course,  involves  the  direction  of  many 
regiments;  and  the  officer  commanding  the  frontier  is 
not  properly  under  the  Commander-in-chief  in  India, 
but  under  the  direction  of  the  Panjab  Government.  In 
the  Peshawar  district,  which  occurs  in  the  midst  of  his 
border,  the  state  of  matters  is  different,  all  the  large 
number  of  troops  there  being  directly  under  the  Com- 
mander-in-chief. That  seems  an  anomalous  state  of 
affairs;  but  the  reason  for  it  is,  that  the  Afghan  frontier 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  349 

being  exceedingly  difficult  to  manage,  the  Government 
of  the  Panjab  is  supposed  to  require  a  large  body  of 
troops  on  that  frontier  at  its  own  direct  disposal,  while 
it  is  equally  necessary  for  the  Commander-in-chief  in 
India  to  have  a  large  force  under  his  orders  at  Peshawar, 
which  fronts  the  Khyber  Pass,  and  is  the  key  of  our 
trans-Indus  possessions. 

Abbotabad  I  saw  when  it  was  in  a  rather  lively  state, 
there  being  a  marriage,  a  death,  and  sundry  other  minor 
events,  during  my  very  brief  stay  there.  It  was  also 
much  exercised  by  a  ritualistic  clergyman,  who  availed 
himself  of  the  rare  occasion  of  a  marriage  to  act  in  a 
manner  which  threw  the  whole  small  community  into  a 
state  of  excitement,  and  who  insisted  on  the  bride  and 
bridegroom  partaking  of  the  sacrament  of  the  Lord's 
Supper  on  the  morning  of  their  wedding-day.  When 
chaplains  in  India  give  themselves  the  rein,  they  can 
indulge  in  many  curious  freaks.  At  another  Indian 
station  which  I  visited,  my  host  told  me  that,  at  an 
evening  party  at  his  (my  host's)  house,  the  chaplain 
marched  his  own  bishop  before  a  large  cheval-glass,  and 
asked' him  if  he  had  seen  the  latest  portrait  of  the  gorilla  ? 
It  is  a  pity  that  the  good  bishop  had  not  the  presence 
of  mind  to  say  that  he  recognised  a  resemblance  in  the 
figure  standing  behind  him.  But  the  Abbotabad  chap- 
lain's proceedings  did  little  more  than  give  a  zest  to  the 
festivities  connected  with  the  marriage,  which  was  that 
of  a  daughter  of  the  popular  officer  commanding  the 
station  ;  but  ere  they  came  to  a  close,  they  were  ter- 
ribly interfered  with  by  the  death  of  Captain  Snow,  who 
expired  suddenly  from  heart-disease — a  malady  which 
seems  to  be  singularly  common  in  the  north  of  India — 
almost  immediately  after  returning  to  his  bungalow  from 
the  communion  service  which  the  chaplain  had  insisted 
on  holding  the  morning  of  the  marriage-day.     He  left  a 


350  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

young  widow;  and  I  have  since  noticed  that  other  mem- 
bers of  those  Abbotabad  parties,  who  were  full  of  life  and 
humour,  and  distinguished  by  more  graceful  charms, 
have  unexpectedly  passed  away. 

From  Abbotabad  I  proceeded  in  three  easy  marches 
to  Torbela,  where  the  dangerous  part  of  the  frontier  com- 
mences. Up  to  Torbela  I  had  only  a  couple  of  sowars, 
or  native  horse-soldiers,  with  me  ;  but  from  the  Indus 
on  to  the  fort  of  Hoti  Mardan,  I  was  guarded  with  as 
much  care  as  if  I  were  three  viceroys  rolled  into  one. 
As  a  matter  of  convenience,  even  a  single  sowar  riding 
behind  one  is  a  nuisance  to  a  meditative  traveller,  espe- 
cially when  the  M.T.  is  suffering  from  rheumatism  in 
the  back,  which  makes  riding  painful  to  him  ;  and  I 
would  gladly  have  dispensed  with  the  escorts  which 
were  provided  for  me.  It  is  not  usual  to  allow  any 
Englishman,  except  officers  on  duty,  to  go  along  this  part 
of  the  frontier,  which  touches  on  the  territory  of  the 
Akoond  of  Swat ;  and  I  was  enabled  to  do  so  only  by 
the  special  permission  of  the  Viceroy  and  the  Comman- 
der-in-chief. The  border  authorities  were  thus  respon- 
sible for  my  safety,  and  they  took  care  to  see  that  no 
harm  befell  me  from  the  wild  tribes  of  the  mountains 
round  the  base  of  which  I  skirted.  The  reason  of  this 
anxiety  was  thus  explained  to  me  by  a  humorous  officer  : 
"  Do  not  suppose,"  he  said,  "  that  the  Panjab  authorities 
mean  to  do  you  any  special  honour ;  they  probably  wish 
you  far  enough.  The  case  is  this  :  if  the  hillmen  get 
hold  of  you — and  they  would  be  very  likely  to  make  a 
dash  at  you  over  the  border  if  you  went  unprotected — 
they  would  carry  you  up  into  the  mountains,  and  would 
then  write  to  the  Panjab  Government  offering  to  ex- 
change you  against  some  of  their  own  budmasJics  which 
we  have  in  prison.  The  Government  would  pro- 
bably take  no  notice  of  this  communication  ;  and,  after 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  351 

the  lapse  of  a  little  time,  there  would  come  down  a 
second  letter  from  the  Swat  hillmen,  repeating  the  pro- 
posal, and  containing  the  first  joint  of  your  little  finger. 
The  next  day  another  letter  would  come  with  the  second 
joint.  Now,  you  see,  it  would  be  extremely  unpleasant 
for  the  Panjab  Government  to  be  receiving  joints  of  your 
fingers,  day  after  day,  in  official  letters." 

Torbela  is  a  village,  or  rather  a  congeries  of  small 
villages,  and  a  large  fortified  police  Thana  on  one  side 
of  the  Indus.  Opposite  to  it,  and  divided  from  this 
extreme  corner  of  our  territory  by  the  river,  there  is  the 
wild  mountain  Afghan  district  of  Bunnair;  and  imme- 
diately opposite  Torbela  there  is  the  fighting  village  of 
Kubbul  or  Kabal,  chock-full  of  murderers  and  other 
fugitives  from  British  justice;  while,  on  the  same  side, 
three  miles  farther  up,  and  also  on  the  right  bank  of  the 
Indus,  there  is  Sitana,  for  long  famous  as  the  headquar- 
ters of  the  Wahabhi  and  other  fanatics,  who  kept  up 
an  agitation  in  India  for  a  jehad,  or  holy  war,  and  are 
supposed  by  some  to  have  instigated  the  assassination 
of  Lord  Mayo  and  of  Mr  Justice  Norman. 

It  occurred  to  me  very  forcibly  here  that  now  or 
never  was  my  chance  of  crossing  the  border  and  seeing 
an  Afghan  village  in  its  primitive  simplicity.  The 
British  Government  does  not  allow  its  subjects  to  cross 
the  border,  owing  to  the  above-mentioned  accident 
which  may  happen  to  their  fingers ;  but  I  thought 
there  could  be  nothing  wrong  in  my  crossing  to  a 
village  which  was  in  sight  of  our  own  territory,  and 
could  easily  be  destroyed.  The  next  day  I  was  to  be 
handed  over  to  the  guards  of  the  Yusufzai  district ; 
and,  meanwhile,  had  only  to  deal  with  the  native 
Thanadar  in  command  of  the  armed  police,  That 
functionary,  however,  would  not  countenance  any  such 
proposal,  and  told  me  that  Kubbul  was  a  particularly 


352  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

bad  place  to  go  to ;  that  a  few  nights  before  it  had 
come  over  and  attacked  one  of  the  villages  on  his  side 
of  the  Indus,  and  that,  at  the  moment,  it  was  righting 
within  itself. 

This  looked  bad  ;  but  fortunately,  a  few  minutes  after, 
one  of  my  servants  came  up  to  the  roof  of  the  Than  a,- on 
which  I  was  sitting,  and  told  me  a  curious  story  about 
the  Jemadar,  the  second  in  command.  That  hero  had 
once  been  in  this  or  some  other  police  Thana,  in  which 
a  considerable  sum  of  money  was  lying,  when  it  was 
attacked  at  night  by  a  number  of  Afghans  from  beyond 
the  border.  Judging  the  attacking  force  to  be  over- 
powering, the  Thanadar  and  his  police  fled,  probably  no 
resistance  being  made  to  that,  as  the  money  was  the 
object  of  the  raid  ;  but  old  Hagan,  as  I  shall  call  the 
Jemadar,  after  the  hero  of  the  "  Nibelungen  Lied,"  who 
fought  a  similar  fight,  but  in  a  less  successful  manner, 
remained  behind,  concealed  in  the  darkness  of  the  night 
and  of  the  Thana.  Before  the  Afghans  had  broken  into 
the  place  where  the  money  was,  he  attacked  them  single- 
handed  with  a  tremendous  sword  which  he  had,  cutting 
down  the  only  torchman  they  had  at  the  first  blow,  and 
then  slashing  away  at  them  indiscriminately.  He  had 
the  advantage  of  knowing  that  every  one  about  him  was 
an  enemy  ;  while  the  Afghans,  taken  by  surprise,  and 
confused  in  the  darkness,  did  not  know  how  many 
assailants  they  had  to  deal  with,  and  began  hewing  at 
each  other,  until  the  cry  got  up  that  the  devil  was 
amongst  them,  and  those  who  were  able  to  do  so  fled. 
The  Assistant  Commissioner  of  the  district  came  over  in 
hot  haste  next  morning  with  a  body  of  mounted  police, 
expecting  to  find  the  treasury  rifled  ;  but,  instead  of 
that,  he  found  my  old  friend  the  Jemadar  strutting  up 
and  down  the  Thana,  sword  in  hand,  while  a  score  of 
Afghans  were  lying  dead  or  dying  round  him. 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  353 

On  hearing  this,  it  immediately  struck  me  that  Hagan 
was  exactly  the  man  intended  to  assist  me  to  Kubbul, 
so  I  got  him  aside  and  asked  him  if  he  would  go. 
Would  he  go  1  Repeating  this  question,  a  strange  wild 
light  broke  out  of  the  old  man's  eyes;  he  unsheathed 
his  tremendous  blade,  of  which  it  might  well  be  said, 
that— 

"The  sword  which  seemed  fit  for  archangel  to  wield, 
Was  light  in  his  terrible  hand  ;  " 

and  eagerly  assured  me  that  if  I  would  only  say  the 
word  he  would  go  with  me  not  only  to  Kubbul,  but  to 
Swat,  which  was  supposed  to  be  the  last  place  in  the 
world  that  an  Englishman  in  his  senses  would  dream  of 
visiting.  I  should  have  been  glad  to  have  accepted  this 
proposal  of  going  to  Swat,  but  felt  bound  in  honour  to 
the  high  officials  who  had  allowed  me  to  go  along  the 
frontier,  not  to  take  anything  which  might  iook  like  an 
unfair  advantage  of  their  kindness.  On  hearing  of  our 
intention  to  cross  the  river,  the  Thanadar — who  seemed 
to  be  a  little  in  awe  of  his  subordinate  of  the  midnight 
massacre,  but  who  was  a  proud  Mohammedan  who  did 
not  like  to  seem  backward  in  courage — said  that  he 
would  go  also,  and,  after  a  little  delay,  produced  a  tall 
red-bearded  old  man,  who  had  friends  on  the  other  side, 
and  would  accompany  us.  I  fancy,  however,  that  he 
must  have  reasoned  with  the  Jemadar  in  private  upon 
the  subject,  because,  before  starting,  that  worthy  took 
me  aside  and  said  that  we  had  better  not  stay  long  in 
Kubbul,  because  when  the  people  in  the  mountains 
heard  of  our  being  there  they  might  come  down  upon 
us.  Our  small  party  was  increased  by  a  somewhat  un- 
willing policeman.  It  was  well  armed,  and  though  I 
preferred  to  trust  to  the  far-famed  hospitality  of  the 
Afghans,  and   make  no  show  of  arms,  I   carried  more 

z 


354  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

than  one  weapon  of  offence  concealed  about  me,  and  in 
handy  positions. 

So  we  crossed  the  splendid  and  rapid  stream  of  the 
Indus  in  a  large  carved  boat  of  white  wood.  The  fight- 
ing village  of  Kubbul  rose  up  almost  from  the  water's 
edge,  and  covered  both  sides  of  a  long  ridge  which  ran 
parallel  with  the  stream,  the  narrow  valley  behind  that 
ridge  being  partly  occupied  by  a  few  grain  fields,  imme- 
diately behind  which  were  high  bare  savage  mountains, 
the  habitat  of  those  individuals  who  are  supposed  to 
send  men's  fingers  in  official  letters.  All  male  Kubbul 
apparently  (female  portion  not  being  visible,  if  indeed 
it  exists  at  all,  which  I  am  not  in  a  position  to  affirm) 
had  turned  out  to  receive  us,  and  lined  the  shore  in  a 
state  of  great  curiosity,  On  landing,  some  rupees  were 
presented  to  me  as  a  token  of  obeisance,  and  I  touched 
them  instead  of  pocketing  them,  as  the  formal  act  in- 
vited me  to  do  ;  but  which  would  have  been  considered 
very  bad  manners  on  my  part,  and  would  probably  have 
sent  all  feelings  and  obligations  of  hospitality  to  the 
winds.  We  were  then  taken  over  the  ridge  into  the 
little  valley  behind,  and  the  head  men  showed  me  with 
great  complacency  the  effects  of  the  warfare  in  which 
they  had  been  engaged  on  the  previous  day.  What 
appeared  to  have  taken  place  was  that  one  end  of  the 
fighting  village  of  Kubbul  had  blown  out  the  other  end, 
the  place  being  in  a  state  of  too  high  pressure.  It  was 
divided  into  two  parts,  and  my  friends  had  made 
breaches  in  the  wall  of  their  neighbours'  half  and  de- 
stroyed the  houses  next  to  that  wall.  They  also  showed 
me  a  mud  tower  which  they  had  taken  and  dismantled  ; 
and  this  was  done  with  so  much  pride  that  I  remarked 
they  must  be  very  fond  of  fighting,  on  which  they 
assumed  quite  a  different  tone,  and  lamented  the  sad 
necessity  they  had  been   under  of  having  recourse  ttf 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  355 

arms — a  necessity  which  was  entirely  due  to  the  bad 
and  desperate  character  of  their  neighbours.  On  this, 
even  the  solemn  Thanadar  smiled  to  me,  for  they  them- 
selves were  about  as  ruffianly  and-  desperate  looking  a 
lot  as  could  well  be  conceived  of.  Where  the  enemy 
was  all  this  time  I  cannot  say.  Perhaps  he  was  up  in 
the  hills,  or  keeping  quiet  in  the  dilapidated  part  of  the 
village;  but  he  could  not  have  been  far  off,  for  the  fight- 
ing was  renewed  that  afternoon  after  we  left,  and  heavy 
firing  went  on.  I  took  care  not  to  inquire  after  him.  It 
was  quite  enough  to  have  one  party  to  deal  with  ;  and 
it  would  have  been  impolitic  to  have  been  appealed  to 
in  the  dispute,  or  to  have  shown  any  interest  in  the  van- 
quished. 

After  this  we  sat  down  in  a  courtyard,  with  a  large 
crowd  round  us,  and  I  was  asked  if  I  would  wait  while 
they  prepared  breakfast  for  me  ;  and  they  pressed  me 
to  do  so.  On  this  the  old  Jemadar  gave  me  a  signifi- 
cant look,  so  I  compromised  the  matter  by  asking  for 
some  milk  only;  and  very  rich  milk  it  was.  Many  of 
the  men  seated  round  us  were  fugitives  from  English 
■justice,  and  they  were  not  slow  to  proclaim  the  fact. 
One  man  told  me  that  he  had  committed  a  murder  seven 
years  before  in  his  own  village,  on  our  side  of  the  Indus; 
and  he  asked  me  whether,  seeing  so  long  a  period  had 
elapsed,  he  might  not  go  back  there  with  safety,  adding 
that  his  conduct  since  then  had  been  remarkably  good : 
he  had  not  killed  any  one  since,  except  in  open  fight. 
I  referred  him  to  the  Thanadar,  who,  in  an  alarmed 
manner,  refused  to  take  any  responsibility  in  such  a 
matter.  Mr  Downes  tells  me  that  when  he  tried  to  go 
from  Peshawar  to  Kafiristan,  and  was  seized,  bound, 
robbed,  and  sent  back,  after  he  had  got  twenty  miles 
beyond  the  frontier,  and  mainly  at  the  instigation  of  the 
Peshawar  police,  the  Afghans  who  seized   him   asked 


356  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


him  if  he  had  committed  murder  or  any  serious  crime  ; 
because  in  that  case  they  would  not  rob  him  or  send 
him  back,  but  would  either  protect  him  or  let  him  go  on 
among  the  mountains  as  he  might  desire  ;  but,  unfor- 
tunately for  his  enterprise,  my  friend  could  not  claim 
the  necessary  qualifications.  Behram  Khan,  who  mur- 
dered Major  Macdonald  this  year  of  my  journey  and 
immediately  crossed  the  frontier,  has  never  been  deli- 
vered up  or  punished,  though  the  Amir  of  Kaubul  has 
professed  great  desire  to  get  hold  of  him,  and  has  issued 
strict  orders  for  his  apprehension.  The  having  com- 
mitted any  serious  crime,  and  being  a  fugitive  from 
justice,  will  secure  protection  among  the  Afghans ;  but 
they  have  a  special  respect  for  murderers.  Even  that, 
however,  is  not  a  sufficient  protection  beyond  a  certain 
point ;  for,  as  Dr  Bellew  says,  "  if  the  guest  be  worth  it, 
he  is  robbed  or  murdered  by  his  late  host  as  soon  as 
beyond  the  protecting  limits  of  the  village  boundary,  if 
not  convoyed  by  badraga  of  superior  strength."  The 
badraga  is  a  body  of  armed  men  who  are  paid  to  con- 
voy travellers  through  the  limits  of  their  own  territory ; 
so  that,  after  all,  the  protection  is  in  great  part  of  a 
venal  kind. 

The  men  who  crowded  round  us  did  not  carry  their 
swords  or  matchlocks,  but  they  all  had  daggers,  and 
some  of  them  had  been  slightly  wounded  in  the  fighting 
of  the  previous  day.  Most  of  the  daggers  were  very 
formidable  instruments,  being  about  a  foot  and  a  half 
long,  thick  at  the  base,  tapering  gradually,  very  sharp 
at  the  point,  sometimes  round  or  three-cornered,  slightly 
curved,  and  with  thick,  strong  handles,  capable  of  afford- 
ing an  adequate  grasp.  They  are  not  like  the  orna- 
mental articles  of  the  kind  which  we  see  in  Europe,  but 
are  meant  for  use,  and  would  slither-  into  one  with  great 
ease,  and  make  a  deep,  fatal  wound.     When  these  noble 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  357 

borderers  stab  in  the  stomach,  as  they  are  fond  of  doing, 
they  have  a  hideous  way  of  working  the  dagger  in  the 
wound  before  withdrawal,  in  order  to  make  assurance 
doubly  sure.  There  was  really,  however,  not  the  least 
danger  from  these  people,  unless  from  some  extreme 
fanatic  amongst  them,  who  would  probably  be  kept 
away  from  me ;  and  though  Sitana  was  within  sight,  I 
learned  that  the  colony  of  discontented  Indians  there 
had  been  removed  further  into  the  mountains,  as  the 
agitation  they  kept  up  in  our  territory  transgressed  even 
the  liberal  bounds  of  Afghan  hospitality.  The  question 
may  well  be  raised  as  to  the  expediency  of  allowing 
fugitives  from  English  justice  to  look  on  us  in  safety 
from  immediately  across  the  border;  but  it  is  at  least 
obvious  that  we  could  not  well  interfere  with  them  with- 
out departing  from  the  whole  line  of  policy  which  we 
have  pursued  towards  Afghanistan  of  late  years.  That 
policy  may  be — and,  I  think,  is — a  mistaken  one ;  but, 
if  adhered  to  at  all,  we  require  to  treat  the  border  as  a 
line  which  neither  party  should  transgress  in  ordinary 
circumstances. 

On  recrossing  the  river,  a  number  of  the  youth  of 
Kubbul  accompanied  us  on  mussaks,  or  inflated  hides, 
on  which  they  moved  with  considerable  rapidity,  the 
front  of  the  mussak  being  in  form  something  like  a 
swan's  breast,  and  gliding  easily  through  or  over  the 
water.  Some  of  these  skins  were  so  small  that  they 
must  have  been  those  of  sheep  or  young  calves,  and 
each  bore  a  single  swimmer,  whose  body  was  thus  kept 
out  of  the  water  while  his  limbs  were  free  to  paddle  in 
it.  From  this  point  to  its  origin,  about  the  Tibetan 
Kailas,  great  part  of  the  long  sweep  of  the  Indus  is 
unknown  to  Europeans,  and  its  course  is  set  down  011 
our  maps  by  a  conjectural  dotted  line.  We  know  it 
again  where  it  enters  Baltistan,  and  as  it  passes  through 


358  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Ludak,  but  that  is  all.  Indus  incolis  Sindus  apprtlatus, 
said  Pliny,  and  the  Sanscrit  meaning  of  the  word  is  said 
to  be  "  the  sea ; "  but  the  Aryans  who  spoke  Sancrit 
must  have  had  rather  vague  ideas  as  to  what  the  sea 
was.  As  the  Sutlej  is  supposed  to  proceed  from  the 
mouth  of  a  crocodile,  so  the  Indus  comes  from  that  of 
a  lion.  Edward  Thornton,  in  his  "  Gazetteer  of  the 
Countries  adjacent  to  India,"  has  collected  and  repro- 
duced all  the  information  of  any  importance  we  have  in 
regard  to  this  great  and  historically  interesting  river, 
and  I  must  refer  my  reader  to  that  work  for  the  details, 
as  also  to  General  Cunningham's  "  Ladak."  It  has  been 
measured  near  Torbela,  and  found  to  be  loo  yards 
broad  ;  but  at  Torbela  I  should  think  it  was  about  200 
yards,  though  the  current  was  rapid  and  deep.  Between 
that  place  and  Attock  it  is  so  shallow  in  winter,  when  it 
is  not  fed  by  melting  snow,  that  there  are  several  points 
at  which  it  can  be  forded.  From  this  point,  also,  boats 
can  go  down  all  the  way  to  the  sea,  as  they  can  also 
from  very  near  Kaubul,  floating  down  the  Kaubul  river 
till  it  reaches  the  Indus. 

Starting  from  Torbela  on  the  afternoon  of  this  day,  I 
went  about  seven  or  eight  miles  down  the  left  bank  of 
the  Indus  to  a  ferry  there,  nearly  opposite  the  mighty 
rock  of  Pihur,  which  rises  on  the  opposite  shore,  or 
rather  almost  out  of  the  bed  of  the  river,  for  in  seasons 
of  flood  this  rock  is  surrounded  by  the  stream.  Here 
I  was  passed  over  from  the  protection  of  the  Huzara 
authorities  to  those  of  the  Yusufzai  district.  Crossing 
the  great  river  in  another  of  those  large  high-pooped 
carved  boats  of  white  wood,  such  as,  in  all  probability, 
bore  Alexander  the  Great  across  the  Indus,  on  the 
opposite  bank  a  very  strange  sight  appeared  which 
looked  as  if  it  might  have  been  taken  out  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  or  even  out  of  the  time  of  the  Grecian 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  359 

conqueror.  The  boundary-line  between  our  territory 
and  that  cf  Afghanistan  here  leaves  the  Indus  and  runs 
along  the  foot  of  the  Hindu  Kush,  and  one  is  supposed 
now  to  be  in  special  need  of  being  taken  care  of;  so  I 
was  received  on  landing,  and  with  great  dignity,  by  a 
number  of  Afghan  Khans  belonging  to  our  side  of  the 
border,  by  a  native  officer  of  police,  a  body  of  mounted 
police,  and  a  number  of  the  retainers  of  the  Khans, 
some  of  whom  were  horsemen  in  chain-armour. 

Nothing  could  be  more  picturesque  than  the  scene.  It 
was  now  evening,  and  through  the  clear  air  the  red  light 
of  the  setting  sun  flamed  over  the  yellow  sands  of  the 
Indus,  and  burned  on  the  high  summits  of  the  wild 
mountains  around.  The  Afghan  chiefs,  with  the  re- 
tainers beside  them,  and  their  fine  horses,  were  pic- 
turesque enough  figures ;  but  the  most  picturesque 
feature  in  the  scene  was,  undoubtedly,  the  men  in  chain- 
armour,  who  carried  immensely  long  spears,  rode  the 
wildest  and  shaggiest  looking  of  horses,  wore  brass 
helmets  on  their  heads  over  crimson  handkerchiefs,  and 
galloped  about  between  us  and  the  hills,  shaking  their 
long  spears,  as  if  an  immediate  descent  of  the  «enemy 
was  expected  and  they  were  prepared  to  do  battle  for 
us  to  the  death.  Unfortunately,  the  enemy  never  did 
put  in  an  appearance  all  the  way  along  the  border ; 
but  the  men  in  armour  did  very  well  instead,  and  im- 
parted a  delightful  sense  of  danger  to  the  mysterious 
mountains. 

The  rock  of  Pihur  is  between  300  and  400  feet  high, 
and  it  would  be  a  pleasant  place  of  residence  were  it  not 
for  the  wind,  which  blows  very  violently  up  or  down  the 
Indus  valley,  and  did  so  all  night  when  I  was  there. 
Here  I  began  to  realise  for  the  first  time  (belief  being 
quite  a  different  thing)  that  I  was  of  some  importance 
in  the  world.     Guards  slept  in  the  veranda  of  the  bun- 


360  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

galow  in  which  I  was,  though  it  was  placed  on  the 
extreme  summit  of  the  rock,  and  looked  down  preci- 
pices ;  guards  paced  round  it  all  night  ;  there  was  a 
guard  half-way  down  the  rock  ;  another  guard  at  the 
foot  of  the  rock ;  and  when  I  looked  down  to  the 
valley  below,  in  the  morning  before  day-break,  there 
were  my  friends  in  chain-armour  riding  round  the  rock 
in  the  moonlight,  but  slowly,  and  drooping  in  their 
saddles  as  if  they  were  asleep  and  recruiting  after  the 
fatigues  of  the  day. 

From  Pihur  we  rode  about  twenty  miles  along  the 
base  of  the  mountains  to  the  Thana  of  Swabi,  passing 
through  the  village  of  Topi,  the  Khan  of  which  accom- 
panied us  on  the  journey.  The  mountains  here  and  all 
along  the  border  have  a  very  singular  effect,  because 
they  rise  so  suddenly  above  the  plain.  Our  trans-Indus 
territory  is  here  almost  a  dead  level,  being  broken  only 
by  water-courses,  at  this  season  dry,  which  descends 
abruptly  below  the  surface  of  the  plain.  From  this  wide 
level,  which  is  scarcely  1 800  feet  above  the  sea,  the 
mountains  of  the  Hindu  Kush  rise  quite  abruptly  for 
thousands  of  feet,  range  towering  above  range  till  we 
come  to  the  line  of  snowy  summits.  As  I  have  already 
pointed  out,  these  mountains  are  really  a  continuation 
of  the  Himaliya,  being  separated  from  the  latter  by  the 
gorge  of  the  Indus,  and  running  more  directly  to  the 
west.  Sir  A.  Burnes  has  told  us  that  the  name  Hindu 
Kush  is  unknown  to  the  Afghans,  but  that  there  is  a 
particular  peak,  and  also  a  pass,  bearing  that  name. 
This  mountain  is  far  from  our  present  neighbourhood, 
being  between  Afghanistan  and  Turkestan.  A  good  deal 
of  doubt  hangs  over  the  derivation  and  meaning  of  the 
word  ;  but,  fancifully  or  not,  the  Kush  has  been  iden- 
tified with  the  Caucasus  of  Pliny,  and  the  whole  of  the 
immense  range  from  the  Himaliya  to  the  Paropamisan 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  3^1 

• 

Mountains,  is  known  in  this  country  as  the  Indian  Cau- 
casus. It  is  supposed  to  have  a  maximum  height  of 
about  20,000  feet,  but  very  little  really  is  known  about 
it,  and  that  adds  to  the  interest  of  the  range.  Its  highest 
peak  or  cluster  of  peaks  appears  to  be  the  Koh-i-Baba, 
the  Hindu  Kush  proper,  between  Kaubul  and  Bami'an  ; 
and  in  the  near  neighbourhood  of  the  British  border 
there  seem  to  be  no  peaks  quite  16,000  feet  high, 
though  some  way  back  from  it,  beyond  Swat,  there  is 
one  of  18,564,  and  another  of  19,132,  the  altitudes  of 
these  heights,  I  presume,  having  being  taken  from 
points  within  our  own  territory,  or  that  of  Kashmir. 
In  geological  formation  these  mountains  do  not  seem  to 
differ  much  from  the  Himaliya,  being  chiefly  composed 
of  quartz,  granite,  gneiss,  mica-schist,  slates,  and  lime- 
stone ;  but  they  are  richer  in  metals — namely,  gold, 
lead,  copper,  tin,  iron,  and  antimony.  The  most  re- 
markable difference  between  the  two  ranges  is,  that  in 
their  western  portion  the  Hindu  Kush  are  not  backed  to 
the  north  by  elevated  table-lands  like  those  of  Tibet, 
but  sink  abruptly  into  the  low  plains  of  Turkestan. 
They  are  even  more  destitute  of  wood  than  the  Hi- 
maliya, but  have  more  valleys,  which  are  sometimes 
better  than  mere  gorges. 

The  Thana  at  Swabi  is  a  very  large  strong  place, 
with  high  walls,  and  could  stand  a  siege  by  the  moun- 
taineers. It  was  here  arranged  that  I  should  make  a 
day's  excursion,  and  recross  the  frontier,  in  order  to  visit 
the  famous  ruins  of  Ranikhet  or  Ranigat.  This,  however, 
I  was  told,  was  not  a  journey  to  be  lightly  undertaken. 
The  Thanadar  of  Swabi,  the  officer  of  police,  and  quite 
a  number  of  Afghan  Khans,  with  their  followers  (in- 
cluding the  inevitable  horsemen  in  chain-armour), 
thought  it  necessary  to  accompany  me,  all  armed  to 
the  teeth,  and  mounted  on  fine  horses.     The  chiefs  who 


362  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

went  with  me  were  Mir  Ruzzun,  Khan  of  Topi ;  Manir, 
Khan  of  Jeda  ;  Shah  Aswur,  Khan  of  Manir  ;  Sumundu, 
Khan  of  Maneri ;  Amir,  Khan  of  Shewa  ;  Husain  Shah, 
the  Thanadar  of  Swabi  ;  and  the  officer  of  police,  Khan 
Bahadur  Jhunota,  or  some  such  name.  It  was  a  most 
imposing  retinue  ;  and  in  lieu  of  my  solid  Khiva  horse, 
they  mounted  me  on  a  splendid  and  beautiful  steed, 
which  would  have  been  much  more  useful  than  my  own 
for  the  purpose  of  running  away,  if  that  had  been  at  all 
necessary.  I  could  well,  however,  have  dispensed  with 
this  arrangement,  for  by  this  time  I  had  begun  to  suffer 
intensely  from  intercostal  rheumatism  ;  I  could  get  no 
sleep  because  of  it,  and  every  quick  movement  on  horse- 
back was  torture.  I  should  like  to  have  ridden  slowly 
to  Ranigat,  a  distance  of  about  twelve  miles  from  the 
Thana,  as  the  quietest  and  humblest  of  pilgrims  ;  but  it 
is  impossible  to  ride  slowly  on  a  blood-horse,  with  half- 
a-dozen  Afghan  Khans  prancing  round  you ;  and  how- 
ever much  you  wished  to  do  so,  the  blood-horse  would 
object,  so  I  had  to  lead  a  sort  of  steeplechase,  especially 
in  coming  back,  when,  my  blood  having  got  thoroughly 
heated  by  torture  and  climbing,  the  rheumatism  left  me 
for  the  nonce,  and  by  taking  a  bee  line,  I  easily  out- 
stripped the  Khans,  who  must  have  been  somewhat 
exhausted  by  their  long  fast,  it  being  the  month  of 
Ramadan,  when  good  Mohammedans  do  not  taste 
anything  from  sunrise  to  sunset.  This  horse  I  had 
must  have  been  worth  £200  at  least ;  and  when  I  re- 
turned it  to  its  owner,  he  told  me  that  he  could  not 
think  of  taking  it  away  from  me  after  I  had  done  him 
the  honour  of  riding  upon  it.  I  accepted  this  offer  at 
its  true  value,  and  found  no  difficulty  in  getting  the 
Khan  to  take  back  his  steed.  I  was  curious  enough  to 
inquire  at  Mardan  what  would  have  been  the  result  if  I 
had  accepted  the  offer,  and  was  told  that  it  would  have 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  363 

caused  endless  indignation,  and  would  probably  have 
led  to  the  murder,  not  of  myself,  but  of  somebody  who 
had  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  the  affair. 

Leaving  our  horses  at  the  little  village  of  Nowigram, 
we  climbed  on  foot  for  a  thousand  feet  up  the  steep  hill  on 
which  are  the  ruins  of  Ranigat.  General  Cunningham* 
has  the  merit  of  having  identified  this  place  with  the 
Aornos  of  Alexander  the  Great.  The  antiquarian 
discussion  on  this  point  would  hardly  interest  the 
general  reader  ;  so  I  shall  only  say  that  no  other  place 
which  has  been  suggested  suits  Aornos  so  well  as 
Ranigat,  though  something  may  be  said  in  favour  of 
General  Abbott's  view,  that  Aornos  was  the  Mahaban 
mountain."|*  Rani-gat  means  the  Queen's  rock,  and  got 
this  name  from  the  Rani  of  Raja  Vara.  It  has  every 
appearance  of  having  been  a  petra  or  "  rock-fortress," 
the  word  applied  to  Aornos  by  Diodorus  and  Strabo. 
The  Khans  who  were  with  me  called  Ranigat  a  fort, 
and  any  one  would  do  so  who  had  not  a  special  power 
of  discovering  the  remains  of  ancient  monasteries.  Dr 
Bellew  does  not  seem  to  have  visited  this  place  ;  but  in 
his  valuable  report  on  the  Yusufzai  district,!  he  refers 
to  it  as  one  of  a  series  of  ruins,  and  dwells  on  the 
monastic  features  which  they  present.  He  is  especially 
eloquent  on  the  "hermit  cells,"  which,  he  says,  "are  met 
with  on  the  outskirts  of  the  ruins  of  Ranigat;"  and 
argues  that  the  apertures  sloping  from  them,  and 
opening  out  on  the  faces  of  the  precipices,  were  "  for  the 
purpose  of  raking  away  ashes  and  admitting  a  current 
of  air  upwards."  Having  got  so  far,  the  learned  doctor 
proceeds  to  draw  a  pleasing  picture  of  the  priests  issuing 
from  their  chambers,   crossing    to  the   gateway  of  the 

*  See  his  "  Ancient  Geography  of  India,  I.  The  Budhist  Period,"  p.  5S. 
+  See  Journal  of  t/ie  Asiatic  Society  of  Bengal,  1854.  p.  309,  and  1863, 
p.  409.  X  Government  Press.      Lahore,  1864. 


364  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

temple,  ascending  its  steps,  making  their  obeisance  to 
the  assembly  of  the  gods,  offering  incense,  making 
sacrifices,  "  and  then  retiring  for  meditation  to  the 
solemn  and  dark  silence  of  their  subterranean  cells."  Un- 
fortunately, however,  there  is  another  and  much  more 
probable  theory  in  regard  to  these  subterranean  cells,  and 
that  is  that  they  were  simply  public  latrines.  Hence 
the  sloping  aperture  out  on  the  precipices.  The  plateau 
which  forms  the  summit  of  the  hill  is  strongly  fortified 
by  immensely  strong  buildings  which  run  round  it,  and 
are  composed  of  great  blocks  of  hewn  stone  sometimes 
carefully  fitted  on  each  other,  and  in  other  places 
cemented  as  it  were  by  small  stones  and  thin  slabs. 
This  plateau  is  about  1200  feet  in  length  by  800  in 
breadth,  and  is  a  mass  of  ruins.  Separated  from  the 
external  works  and  the  "subterranean  cells,"  the  citadel 
is  500  feet  long  and  400  broad.  A  number  of  broken 
statues,  chiefly  figures  of  Budha,  have  been  found 
among  these  ruins,  and  also  one  statue  with  the  Mace- 
donian cloak.  The  whole  of  this  Yusufzai  district  is 
full  of  the  most  interesting  antiquarian  remains,  such 
as  ruins,  statues,  bas-reliefs,  and  coins,  indicating  the 
existence  of  a  large  population,  of  great  cities,  of  arts,  of 
an  advanced  civilisation,  and  of  nations  which  have  long 
since  disappeared.  A  great  part  of  these  remains  are 
Budhistic,  a  few  have  relation  to  Alexander  the  Great  and 
his  Greeks,  and  a  larger  number  belong  to  the  empires 
of  the  Graeco-Bactrians,  Indo-Bactrians,  and  Scythians. 
In  order  to  do  justice  to  this  subject,  a  fuller  treatment 
of  it  would  be  necessary,  but  I  must  content  myself 
with  merely  alluding  to  it. 

There  is  a  fine  wild  view  from  Ranigat  up  the 
mountains  of  the  Hindu  Kush,  and  it  is  close  to  the 
entrance  of  the  Umbeyla  Pass,  wherea  (ew  years  ago 
we  had   some  very  severe  fighting  with  the  hill-men. 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  365 

Their  conduct  had  rendered  it  necessary  to  teach  them 
a  lesson,  and  a  large  British  force  was  sent  into  the 
pass ;  but  the  Afghans  swarmed  down  upon  it  in  large 
numbers  and  fought  like  devils.  The  British  soldier  did 
not  show  to  his  usual  advantage  in  this  campaign,  and 
one  regiment  retreated  rather  ignominiously  from  a  post 
which  it  ought  to  have  held.  In  order  to  insure  the 
retaking  of  this  position,  Sir  Neville  Chamberlain,  the 
commander  of  the  force,  placed  himself  at  the  head  of 
the  attacking  column,  and,  rumour  has  it,  turned  round 
and  said,  "  There  must  be  no  running  away  this  time," 
on  which  the  colonel  of  one  regiment  replied,  "The 
— th  don't  require  to  be  told  that,  General." 

This  portion  of  Afghanistan  is  scarcely  even  nominally 
under  the  sway  of  the  Amir  of  Kaubul,  and  is  virtually 
ruled  by  the  Akoond  of  Swat,  who  is  rather  a  spiritual 
than  a  temporal  prince,  but  exercises  a  good  deal  of 
temporal  power  over  the  chiefs  in  his  territory.  He  was 
ninety  years  old  at  the  time  of  my  visit  to  the  Yusufzai, 
and  had  the  reputation  of  being  an  extremely  bigoted 
Mohammedan,  not  averse  to  stirring  up  a  jehad  against 
the  infidels  in  India ;  and  in  this  respect  his  son  was 
said  to  be  even  worse  than  himself.  Fortunately,  how- 
ever, we  have  a  oounter-check  to  him  in  the  Mullah  of 
Topi,  within  our  own  district,  who  exercises  a  great 
religious  influence  over  the  Afghans,  and  is  a  rival  of 
the  Akoond. 

I  had  made  a  good  deal  of  acquaintance  with 
Afghans  before  this  journey,  and  must  say  a  word  in 
regard  to  their  character.  They  are  a  very  strange  mix- 
ture of  heroism  and  cowardice,  fidelity  and  treachery, 
kindness  and  cruelty,  magnanimity  and  meanness,  high- 
sounding  morality  and  unspeakably  atrocious  vicious- 
ness.  Though  their  language  affords  no  countenance 
to  their  own  belief  that  they  are  sons  of  Israel,  and  the 


366  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

linguist  scoffs  at  this  supposition  in  his  usual  manner, 
I  think  there  is  something  in  it.  In  physical  appear- 
ance and  in  character  they  resemble  the  Hebrews  of 
history;  and  it  is  unscientific,  in  judging  of  the  origin 
of  a  people,  to  place  exclusive  reliance  on  one  par- 
ticular, such  as  language.  Much  meditation  over  this 
subject  has  also  convinced  me  that  our  modern  writers 
are  far  too  much  given  to  drawing  hard  and  fast  lines 
when  treating  of  ethnology.  They  get  hold  of  a  race  or 
a  nation  somewhere  in  the  past,  and  virtually,  indeed 
often  unconsciously,  assume  that  it  has  become  stereo- 
typed for  all  time,  leaving  out  of  mind  that  circum- 
stances similar  to  those  which  form  a  race  are  continually 
modifying  its  peculiarities.  As  to  the  Afghans,  I  deem 
it  likely  that  there  is  some  truth  in  all  the  theories 
which  have  been  started  as  to  their  origin.  They  are 
probably  partly  Semitic,  partly  Aryan,  partly  Asiatic, 
and  partly  European.  There  is  nothing  improvable  in 
the  supposition  that  their  Hebrew  blood  has  been 
mingled  with  that  of  the  soldiers  of  Alexander  the 
Great  and  of  the  Greek  colonists  of  the  Graeco-Bactrian 
kingdoms,  and  also  of  the  Asiatic  Albanians  who  were 
driven  across  Persia.  The  Indo-Bactrians,  again,  may 
have  modified  the  race;  and  this  theory  of  a  com- 
posite origin  affords  some  explanation  of  the  incon- 
sistencies of  the  Afghan  character. 

Afghan  history  is  a  dreadful  story  of  cruelty,  faithless- 
ness, perfidy,  and  treachery.  Though  they  may  under- 
stand the  matter  among  themselves,  yet  it  is  impossible 
for  the  European  to  draw  any  line  within  which  the 
Pathans  may  be  trusted.  The  tomb  of  Cain  is  said  to 
be  in  Kaubul,  and  the  popular  belief  is  that  the  devil 
fell  there  when  he  was  thrown  out  of  heaven.  These  are 
the  views  of  the  Afghans  themselves,  and  a  double 
portion  of  the  spirit  of  Cain  seems  to  have  descended 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  367 

upon  them.  In  one  small  village  through  which  I 
passed,  there  had  been  twelve  secret  assassinations 
within  nine  months.  Among  these  people  you  have 
perpetually  recurring  reasons,  in  the  shape  of  dead 
bodies,  for  putting  the  questions,  "  Who  is  she  ? "  and 
"  How  much  was  it?"  for  their  murders  proceed  usually 
from  quarrels  as  to  women,  or  land,  or  cattle.  A  good 
many  of  our  officers  on  the  frontier  have  been  assas- 
sinated, sometimes  out  of  mere  wantonness,  and  they 
have  to  go  about  armed  or  guarded.  The  Afghan 
monarch  Shah  Mahmood  owed  his  throne  to  his  Wuzeer 
Futteh  Khan  (Barukzei),  and  the  latter  was  always 
careful  not  to  show  any  want  of  allegiance  or  respect 
for  that  sovereign  ;  yet  Shah  Mahmood,  at  the  instiga- 
tion of  a  relative,  had  his  Wuzeer  seized,  and  put  out 
both  his  benefactor's  eyes  in  the  year  18 18.  Then  he 
had  the  unfortunate  blind  man  brought  before  him 
bound,  and  had  him  deliberately  cut  to  pieces — nose, 
ears,  lips,  and  then  the  joints.  This  is  a  characteristic 
Afghan  incident,  and  not  the  less  so  that  it  was  a  ruinous 
act  for  the  perpetrator. 

Sir  Alexander  Burnes,  in  his  account  of  his  journey 
to  Bokhara  (vol.  ii.  p.  124),  says  of  the  Afghans  that,  "if 
they  themselves  are  to  be  believed,  their  ruling  vice  is 
envy,  which  besets  even  the  nearest  and  dearest  relations. 
No  people  are  more  capable  of  managing  intrigue."  And 
yet  he  adds,  "  I  imbibed  a  very  favourable  impression 
of  their  national  character."  But  this  vice  of  envy  is 
peculiarly  the  characteristic  which  marks  off  the  lower 
from  the  higher  portion  of  the  human  race  ;  it  has,  not 
inappropriately,  been  assigned  as  the  cause  of  angels 
turning  into  devils  ;  and  it  is  curious  to  find  that  a 
people  like  the  Afghans,  who  are  possessed  by  it,  can  still 
excite  admiration.  Mr  T.  P.  Hughes,  a  well-known, 
able    missionary    on    the    border,    who    is    intimately 


368  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 


acquainted  with  these  people,  says  that  "  the  Afghans 
are  a  manly  race,  of  sociable  and  lively  habits.  All 
Europeans  who  have  come  in  contact  with  them  have 
been  favourably  impressed  with  the  very  striking  con- 
trast exhibited  by  our  trans-Indus  subjects  to  the  mild 
Hindu  and  the  miserable  Hindusthani  and  Panjabi 
Mohammedans."  He  also  says  that  their  "  manly 
qualities  are  not  unequal  to  our  own,"  and  that  "  there 
are  elements  of  true  greatness  in  the  Afghan  national 
character."  Yet  I  was  assured  by  more  than  one  excel- 
lent authority  that  one  of  the  most  hideous  of  all  vices 
is  openly  practised  in  Kaubul,  where  a  bazaar  or  street 
is  set  apart  for  it;  and  that  even  in  Peshawar  the  agents 
of  the  Church  Mission  require  to  be  cautious  in  their 
conduct  towards  the  boys  under  their  tuition.  It  is  the 
extraordinary  union  of  virtues  and  vices  which  forms 
the  most  puzzling  feature  in  the  Afghan  character.  To  , 
courage,  strength,  and  the  other  better  features  of  a  wild 
sentimental  mountain  people,  they  unite  vices  which  are 
usually  attributed  to  the  decrepitude  of  corrupt  civilisa- 
tions and  dying  races  ;  and  though  their  fidelity  is  often 
able  to  overcome  torture  and  death,  it  as  often  succumbs 
to  the  most  trivial  and  meanest  temptations. 

I  am  inclined  to  believe  that  much  of  the  badness  of 
the  Afghans  is  owing  to  the  influence  of  Mohammedan- 
ism. One  might  expect  that  so  simple  and  intelligible 
a  religion,  holding  the  doctrine  of  the  unity  of  God,  and 
admitting  Christ  as  one  of  its  line  of  prophets,  would  be 
superior  in  its  effects  to  polytheistic  Hinduism,  and  espe- 
cially to  Brahmanism,  the  acceptance  of  which  after  and 
in  face  of  Biidhism,  involved  a  moral  suicide  on  the  part 
of  the  people  of  India.  But  certainly  my  knowledge  of 
India  does  not  support  that  conclusion.  Among  a 
purely  Semitic  race  like  the  Arabs,  secluded  among 
their  deserts    and    at    a    certain    stereotyped    stage    of 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  369 

thought,  Mohammedanism  may  be  good,  and  it  undoubt- 
edly appears  to  have  exercised  a  beneficial  influence 
in  its  removal  of  ancient  superstitions ;  but  in  the  larger 
sphere  and  greater  complications  of  modern  life  it  be- 
comes an  evil  influence,  from  its  essentially  Pharisaical 
character  and  its  want  of  power  to  touch  the  human 
heart.  I  need  not  speak  of  Christianity  or  of  Budhism, 
with  their  enthusiasm  of  love  and  their  doctrines  of  self- 
sacrifice  :  but  even  in  Brahmanism  there  are  humanising 
influences;  and  in  the  older  Hinduism,  as  Dr  John  Muir 
has  so  well  shown  by  his  metrical  translations,  the  law 
of  love  finds  an  important  place.  It  is  not  even  the 
worst  of  Mohammedanism  that  it  is  a  system  of  exter- 
nal observances  and  mechanical  devotion.  Its  central 
idea,  as  elaborated  to-day,  is  that  of  the  Creator  and 
Governor  of  the  universe  as  a  merciless  tyrant,  ruling 
after  the  caprice  of  a  fathomless  will,  breaking  the  clay 
of  humanity  into  two  pieces,  throwing  the  one  to  the 
right  saying,  "  These  into  heaven,  and  I  care  not ;"  and 
the  other  to  the  left  saying,  "  These  into  hell,  and  I  care 
not."  Whenever  God  is  thus  regarded  as  an  arbitrary 
tyrant,  instead  of  an  all-loving  Father  whose  dealings 
with  His  children  transcend  our  knowledge  but  do  not 
revolt  our  moral  consciousness,  religion,  or  rather  that 
which  takes  its  place,  becomes  a  frightful  instrument  of 
evil:  and  even  when  the  natural  working  of  the  human 
heart  is  too  strong  to  allow  of  its  being  carried  out  prac- 
tically to  its  logical  conclusions,  on  the  other  hand,  it 
prevents  our  higher  sympathies  from  being  of  much 
practical  use.  It  is  worthy  of  such  a  system  that  it 
should  regard  a  few  external  observances,  and  the  mere 
utterance  of  such  a  formula  as,  "  There  is  no  God  but 
God,  and  Mohammed  is  His  prophet,"  as  insuring  an 
entrance  into  heaven,  and  that  its  heaven  should  be  one 
of  purely  sensual  delight.     I  do  not  mean  to  say  that 

2  A 


370  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

Mohammed  is  responsible  for  all  that  Mohammed- 
anism has  become  ;  for  even  in  this  case  there  has  been 
manifested  that  curious  tendency  of  religions  to  thrust 
forward  and  deify  that  which  their  founders  began  with 
repudiating  and  condemning ;  but  he  is  in  great  part  re- 
sponsible, and  of  all  famous  books  in  the  world,  the 
Kuran  is  about  the  least  edifying. 

Hardy,  brave,  mean,  and  wicked  a  people  as  the  Af- 
ghans are,  they  are  great  lovers  of  poetry,  and  have 
produced  not  a  little  poetry  of  a  high  order.  They  are 
very  fond,  at  night,  round  their  camp-fires,  of  reciting 
verses,  and  these  verses  are  usually  of  a  melancholy 
kind,  relating  to  love,  war,  the  unsatisfactoriness  of  all 
earthly  enjoyment,  and  the  cruelty  of  fate.  Captain 
H.  G.  Raverty  has  rendered  a  great  service  in  presenting 
us  with  an  almost  literal  translation  of  the  productions 
of  the  more  famous  Afghan  poets  ;*  and  these  do  not 
at  all  make  the  Afghan  character  more  intelligible. 
When  the  women  of  a  village  ventured  to  come  out  to 
look  at  me,  usually  some  man  with  a  big  stick  drove 
them  away  with  heavy  blows,  and  remarks  upon  them 
which  even  a  Rabelais  would  have  hesitated  to  report ; 
yet  the  Afghans  have  romantic  ideas  of  love,  and  are 
fond  of  singing  these  beautiful  lines  : — 

"  Say  not  unto  me,  'Why  swearest  thou  by  me?' 
If  I  swear  not  by  thee,  by  whom  shall  I  swear? 

Thou,  indeed,  art  the  very  light  of  mine  eyes  ; 
This,  by  those  black  eyes  of  thine,  I  swear  ! 

In  this  world  thou  ait  my  life  and  my  soul, 

And  nought  else  besides  ;  unto  thee,  my  life,  I  swear ! 

Thou  art  in  truth  the  all-engrossing  idea  of  my  mind, 
Every  hour,  every  moment,  by  my  God,  I  swear  1 

*  "  Selections  from  the  Poetry  of  the'  Afghans,  from  the  Sixteenth  to 
the  Nineteenth  Century.  Literally  translated  from  the  original  Pushtao." 
London,  1862. 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  37  r 

The  dust  of  thy  feet  is  an  ointment  for  the  eyes — 
By  this  very  dust  beneath  thy  feet  I  swear  ! 

My  heart  ever  yearneth  toward  thee  exceedingly — 
By  this  very  yearning  of  mine  unto  thee  I  swear ! 

When  thou  laughest,  they  are  nothing  in  comparison, 
Both  rubies  and  pearls — by  thy  laugh  I  swear ! 

Truly  I  am  thy  lover,  and  thine,  thine  only — 
And  this  I,  Kushhal,  by  thy  sweet  face  swear  ! " 

Of  the  despairing  melancholy  of  the  Afghan  poets  it 
would  be  easy  to  quote  many  instances  ;  but  I  prefer  to 
give  the  following  example,  also  translated  by  Captain 
Raverty,  by  a  chief  of  the  clan  Khattak,  of  their  stirring 
war-songs : — 

'*  From  whence  hath  the  spring  again  returned  unto  us, 
Which  hath  made  the  country  round  a  garden  of  flowers? 

There  are  the  anemone  and  sweet  basil,  the  lily,  and  the  thyme ; 
The  jasmine  and  white  rose,  the  narcissus,  and  pomegranate  blossom. 

The  wild  flowers  of  spring  are  manifold,  and  of  every  hue  ; 
But  the  dark  red  tulip  above  them  all  predominateth. 

The  maidens  place  nosegays  of  flowers  in  their  bosoms  ; 
The  youths,  too,  fasten  nosegays  of  them  in  their  turbans, 

Come  now,  maidens,  apply  the  bow  to  the  violin ; 
Bring  out  the  tone  and  melody  of  every  string! 

And  thou,  cup-bearer,  bring  us  full  and  overflowing  cups, 
That  I  may  become  fraught  with  wine's  inebriety  1 

The  Afghan  youths  have  again  dyed  red  their  hands, 

Like  as  the  falcon  dyeth  his  talons  in  the  blood  of  the  quarry. 

They  have  made  rosy  their  bright  swords  with  gore  ; 

The  tulip-beds  have  blossomed  even  in  the  heat  of  summer, 

Ae-mal  Khan  and  Dar-ya  Khan — from  death  preserve  them  . — 
Were  neither  of  them  at  fault  when  opportunity  occurred. 

They  dyed  red  the  valley  of  Khyber  with  the  blood  of  the  foe ; 
On  Karrapah,  too,  they  found  both  war's  din  and  tumult. 


372  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

From  Karrapah,  even  unto  Bajawar,  both  plain  and  mountain, 
Time  after  time,  as  from  an  earthquake,  quaked  and  shook." 

One  day's  march  from  Hoti  Mardan,  or  Murdan,  I 
was  handed  over  to  the  care  of  an  escort  of  the  Panjab 
Guides,  a  famous  regiment  which  is  usually  quartered 
in  that  fort.  Its  officers  showed  great  hospitality  and 
kindness,  and  especially  Captain  Hutchison,  whom  I 
had  met  at  Hardvvar,  as  also  in  Kashmir,  and  whose 
shooting  expeditions  had  made  him  familiar  with  some 
of  the  remotest  parts  of  the  Himaliya  and  with  the 
regions  lying  to  the  north  of  Kashmir.  He  had  just 
returned  from  a  journey  into  Gilgit,  which  he  described 
as  exceedingly  barren  and  stony ;  and  his  quarters  in 
the  fort  were  adorned  with  many  trophies  of  the  chase, 
including  quite  a  pile  of  the  skins  of  the  great  snow- 
bear. 

Elsewhere,  I  heard  a  story  of  an  officer  who,  on  get- 
ting leave  after  a  long  period  of  close  service,  went  up 
and  spent  his  leave  at  this  little  remote  fort  of  Hoti 
Mardan,  where  he  had  formerly  been  stationed.  That 
was  adduced  as  a  remarkable  instance  of  English  eccen- 
tricity ;  but  I  can  quite  appreciate  the  man's  choice. 
The  officers  of  a  crack  regiment  in  an  isolated  position 
make  very  good  company  ;  there  is  excellent  sport  of 
various  kinds,  including  hawking,  to  be  had  at  Mardan  ; 
there  is  just  enough  of  personal  danger  connected  with 
a  residence  there  to  keep  one  lively ;  interesting  expedi- 
tions may  be  made  along  or  across  the  frontier ;  the 
whole  country  round  is  full  of  important  antiquities; 
and  the  climate  during  great  part  of  the  year  is  de- 
lightful. 

According  to  the  regimental  records  of  temperature 
for  the  year  1872,  the  thermometer  (in  the  open  air,  but 
in  a  position  sheltered  from  the  sun),  had,  in  the  month 
of  January,  an  extreme  range  from  270  to  640,  and  a 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  373 

mean  range  from  460  to  52°  In  February,  the  extreme 
range  was  from  320  to  730,  and  the  mean  from  480  to  520. 
In  April,  the  extreme  range  was  530  to  910,  and  the  mean 
69°  to  820.  The  hottest  month  was  June,  when  the  ex- 
treme range  was  jo°  to  1090,  and  the  mean  920  to  100°. 
That  sounds  very  dreadful ;  but  the  pure  and  excessively 
dry  air  of  these  regions  does  not  make  a  temperature  of 
1000  so  intolerable  as  a  temperature  of  Zo°  is  in  the 
moist  regions  of  the  coast,  or  during  the  rainy  season, 
in  those  parts  of  India  which  are  much  exposed  to  the 
influence  of  the  south-west  monsoon.  Evaporation  of 
moisture  from  the  skin  and  clothes  is  the  great  source 
of  coolness  in  a  hot  country  ;  and,  of  course,  the  drier 
the  air  is,  the  greater  the  evaporation  and  consequent 
coolness,  while,  the  more  the  air  is  loaded  with  moisture, 
the  less  is  the  evaporation  from  our  persons,  and  the 
more  we  become  like  furnaces  surrounded  by  some  non- 
heat-conducting  substance.  So  early  as  September,  the 
climate  begins  to  be  delightful  at  Hoti  Mardan,  the  tem- 
perature for  that  month  having  an  extreme  range  from 
57°  to  980,  and  a  mean  of  from  700  to  8o°.  After  that 
it  rapidly  approaches  the  results  given  for  January,  and 
becomes  bracing  as  well  as  pleasant. 

I  went  out  hawking  with  the  officers  one  day,  and  we 
had  some  very  fine  sport,  following  the  birds  on  horse- 
back, and  being  much  amused  by  a  large  black  vulture 
— a  pirate  bird — which  once  or  twice  made  its  appear- 
ance just  when  the  falcon  had  hunted  down  its  prey, 
and  proceeded  to  act  on  the  principle  of  sic  vos  11011  vobis, 
which  appears  to  be  one  of  the  fundamental  characteris- 
tics of  organic  life.  Apart  from  its  cruelty  (which  need 
not  be  expatiated  on,  seeing  that  all  action  we  know 
of  involves  cruelty)  the  action  of  the  falcon  was  very 
beautiful  as  it  steadily  pursued  its  prey,  a  species  of 
crane,  I   think,  and  swooping  down  upon  it,  struck  it 


374  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

again  and  again  on  the  base  of  the  skull,  sending  out  a 
small  cloud  of  feathers  at  every  stroke,  until  the  brain 
was  laid  open  and  the  bird  succumbed. 

Some  of  the  officers  at  Fort  Mardan  did  not  trouble 
themselves  to  carry  arms,  relying  upon  their  sticks  or 
heavy  hunting-whips  ;  but  this  was  unwise.  Fort  Michni 
was  in  sight,  and  there  Major  Macdonald  had  a  stick 
when  Behram  Khan  and  the  Khan's  brother  went  up  to 
him  and  fired  into  him  with  guns  from  close  quarters. 
A  stick  becomes  a  satire'  in  such  circumstances.  Even 
arms,  however,  are  not  always  a  sufficient  defence  from 
Afghan  assassins.  Lieutenant  Ommaney,  a  promising 
young  officer  in  civil  employ,  was  killed  in  Hoti  Mardan 
by  a  scoundrel  who  presented  him  with  a  petition  to 
read,  and  then  stabbed  him  suddenly  when  the  English- 
man was  engaged  in  looking  over  the  paper.  In  this 
case  Mr  M'Nab,  the  acting  commissioner  of  the  district, 
on  hearing  of  the  affair  at  night,  rode  immediately  over 
from  Peshawar  to  Mardan,  a  distance  of  over  thirty 
miles,  and  had  the  murderer  hanged  next  morning — 
possibly  without  a  very  strict  regard  to  legal  forms,  but 
in  a  summary  manner,  which  served  to  put  a  check,  for 
the  time  at  least,  upon  what  was  threatening  to  become 
a  too  common  Afghan  amusement. 

The  Panjab  Guides  is  a  rather  peculiar  regiment,  be- 
ing composed  half  of  foot  soldiers  and  half  of  horsemen, 
most  of  whom  are  Afghans,  and  many  from  beyond  our 
border.  They  are  a  splendid  set  of  men,  and  the  regi- 
ment has  always  been  kept  in  an  admirably  effective 
state.  In  the  Panjab  Mutiny  Report*  it  is  said  that  at 
the  outbreak- of  the  great  Indian  Mutiny  "the  Guide 
Corps  marched  from  Mardan  six  hours  after  it  got  the 
order,  and  was  at  Attok  (30  miles  off)  next  morning, 

*  Lahore,  1859  ;  para.  140. 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  375 

fully  equipped  for  service,  'a  worthy  beginning-,'  writes 
Colonel  Edwards,  of  'one  of  the  rapidest  marches  ever 
made  by  soldiers;  for,  it  being  necessary  to  give  General 
Anson  every  available  man  to  attempt  the  recovery  of 
Delhi,  the  Guides  were  not  kept  for  the  movable  column, 
but  were  pushed  on  to  Delhi,  a  distance  of  580  miles, 
or  30  regular  marches,  which  they  accomplished  in  21 
marches,  with  only  three  intervening  halts,  and  these 
made  by  order.  After  thus  marching  27  miles  a-day 
for  three  weeks,  the  Guides  reached  Delhi  on  9th  June, 
and  three  hours  afterwards  engaged  the  enemy  hand  to 
hand,  every  officer  being  more  or  less  wounded.'  "  That 
shows  the  splendid  state  of  efficiency  in  which  the  Guides 
were  kept.  They  did  something  of  the  same  kind  in 
1872,  or  the  beginning  of  1873,  when  sent  to  the  camp 
of  exercise  at  Hassan  Abdul,  and  I  doubt  not  they 
would  do  it  to-morrow  if  necessary.  This  regiment  had 
only  about  half-a-dozen  European  officers  when  I  saw 
it;  but  then  it  was  pretty  well  beyond  the  reach  of  the 
so-called  philanthropic  influences  which  have  weakened 
and  are  destroying  our  position  in  India.  The  officers 
were  free  to  rule  their  men  ;  and  the  consequence  was, 
that  the  soldiers  not  only  looked  up  to,  but  liked,  and 
were  proud  of,  their  officers.  I  must  repeat  emphati- 
cally, that  ability  to  rule  wisely  is  the  only  condition  on 
which  we  have  any  right  to  be  in  India  at  all,  and  that 
the  instant  we  depart  from  that  ground,  trouble  and 
disaster  commence,  whatever  the  character  of  that  de- 
parture may  be — whether  it  consist  in  having  inferior 
English  agents  in  the  country  or  in  curbing  the  hands 
of  the  capable  ones — whether  in  stupid  want  of  appre- 
ciation of  the  natives  of  India  or  in  weak  pandering  to 
their  insaner  ambitions. 

Hoti  Mardan,  as  well  as  the  whole  northern  portion  of 
our  trans-Indus  territory,  is  associated  with  the  name  of 


376  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW. 

a  very  extraordinary  man — General  John  Nicholson, 
who  was  mortally  wounded  at  the  siege  of  Delhi.  No 
Englishman,  at  least  of  late  years,  appears  to  have  left 
so  powerful  a  personal  impression  upon  the  Afghan 
mind.  I  found  it  to  be  quite  true  that  the  Pathans  of 
our  district  believe  that  they  hear  the  hoofs  of  Nichol- 
son's horse  ringing  over  the  trans-Indus  plain  at  night, 
and  that  that  country  shall  never  pass  from  our  posses- 
sion so  long  as  these  sounds  are  heard.  In  the  Institute 
at  Delhi  there  is  an  oil-painting  of  him  which  was  made 
after  his  death,  partly  from  a  small  sketch  and  partly 
from  memory.  It  represents  him  as  having  had  a  long 
head  and  face,  with  dark  hair,  and  a  very  finely  formed 
white  forehead.  In  some  respects  it  reminded  me  of  the 
portrait  of  Sir  Harry  Vane  in  Ham  House,  and  sug- 
gested more  a  man  of  contemplation  than  of  action; 
but  that  is  not  an  unfrequent  characteristic  in  the  coun- 
tenances of  great  soldiers. 

One  of  Nicholson's  most  splendid  achievements  was 
performed  near  this  fort  of  Hoti  Mardan.  He  was 
deputy  commissioner  of  the  district  at  the  time  of  the 
outbreak  of  the  Mutiny,  when  matters  were  in  a  most 
critical  position,  and  the  disaffected  native  soldiers  were 
urged  to  move  by  the  Hindusthani  sepoys  below,  and 
were  in  correspondence  with  the  Afghan  and  other  fana- 
tics of  Swat  and  Sitana.  If  the  Panjab  saved  India,  it. 
was  our  trans-Indus  district,  which  was  the  most  danger- 
ous in  the  Panjdb,  and  it  was  John  Nicholson,  more  em- 
phatically than  any  one  other  man,  who  saved  our  trans- 
Indus  possession.  The  place  of  the  Panjab  Guides, 
when  they  were  despatched  to  Delhi,  was  taken  by  the 
55th  Native  Infantry  and  the  10th  Irregular  Cavalry,  the 
first  of  which  threatened  to  murder  their  officers,  and  the 
second  to  "  roast "  the  civil  officer  of  the  station.  A  very 
small  force  was  sent  to  Mardan  to  deal  with  them,  and 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  377 

it  was  accompanied  by  Nicholson  as  political  officer,  and 
on  its  approach,  the  55th  regiment  broke  and  took  to 
the  hills.  It  was  in  the  end  of  the  month  of  May,  and 
he  had  been  twenty  hours  in  the  saddle,  under  a  burning 
sun,  and  had  ridden  seventy  miles  that  day  ;  *  but,  with- 
out a  moment's  hesitation  he  "hurled  himself  on  the 
fugitives  with  a  handful  of  police  sowars,"  and  did  such 
fearful  execution  that  150  of  them  were  laid  dead  on  the 
line  of  retreat,  150  surrendered,  and  the  greater  number 
of  those  who  escaped  up  the  hills  were  wounded.  The 
moral  effect  of  this,  just  when  everything  was  hanging 
in  the  balance,  cannot  be  over-estimated.  The  tide  of 
mutiny  had  rolled  up  almost  unchecked  until  it  broke 
upon  this  rock. 

It  has  been  well  said  that,  at  the  outbreak  of  the 
Mutiny,  the  valley  of  Peshdwar  stood  in  "  a  ring  of  re- 
pressed hostilities,"  while  beyond  that  lay  the  chronically 
hostile  kingdom  of  Kaubul.  The  military  forces  in  this 
valley  consisted  of  2800  Europeans  and  8000  native 
soldiers  of  all  arms  ;  and  when  the  intelligence  of  the 
events  at  Delhi  and  Meerut  reached  Peshawar,  most  of 
the  native  soldiers  became  ripe  for  mutiny.  It  has  often 
been  alleged  that  the  sepoys  took  no  part  in  the  atroci- 
ties of  this  dreadful  time,  and  that  these  were  committed 
only  by  released  felons  and  other  bad  characters  ;  but  in 
the  "  Panjab  Mutiny  Report "  it  is  stated  (para.  145)  that 
at  Peshdwar,  in  May  1857,  "  the  most  rancorous  and  sedi- 
tious letters  had  been  intercepted  from  Mohammedan 
bigots  in  Patna  and  Thaneysur,  to  soldiers  of  the  64th 
Native  Infantry,  revelling  in  the  atrocities  that  had  been 
committed  in  Hindusthan  on  the  men,  women,  and  chil- 
dren of   the  '  Nazarenes,'  and  sending  them    messages 


*  See  "  Tanjab  Mutiny  Report,''  para.  151. 


373  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW.  ' 

from  their  own  mothers  that  they  should  emulate  these 
deeds."  Communications  also  were  going  on  between 
the  sepoys  in  open  rebellion  and  their  brethren  across 
the  frontier.  It  was  most  fortunate  that  at  this  juncture 
Sir  Sydney  Cotton  ordered  the  disarmament  of  his  native 
troops  ;  and  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  Nicholson 
had  great  influence  in  leading  him  to  do  so;  but  how 
did  he  come  to  do  so  ?  The  Mutiny  Report  mentions 
that  "  this  measure  was  determined  on  under  the  strenu- 
ous opposition  of  the  condemned  corps  ;  some  had  '  im- 
plicit confidence  '  in  their  regiments  ;  others  advocated 
1  conciliation.' "  Of  these  infatuated  old  Indians,  who  have 
their  counterparts  at  the  present  day,  one  colonel  shot 
himself,  when  his  regiment,  the  99th,  revolted,  so  much 
did  he  feel  the  disgrace. 

Peshawar  is  a  very  interesting  place  ;  and  though  the 
acting  commissioner,  Mr  M'Nab,  was  absent  on  the  bor- 
der, I  had  met  with  him  at  Mardan,  and  received  much 
information  and  great  kindness  from  him,  as  well  as 
from  Major  Ommaney,  another  civil  officer,  as  also  from 
Mr  Hughes,  of  the  Church  Mission.  Mr  Ward,  the 
superintendent  of  police,  accompanied  me  up  the  Khyber 
Pass,  near  to  Ali  Musjid,  the  first  camping-ground  on 
the  way  to  Kaubul.  This  is  managed  through  the 
Afridfs,  or  Afreedees,  of  the  fort  of  Jumrood,  which 
stands  on  the  sort  of  no  man's  land — the  desolate  strip 
between  our  territory  and  that  of  Kaubul.  The  Khy- 
berfs  are  a  rapacious  and  sanguinary  lot,  and  it  does  not 
do  to  enter  their  territory  without  protection  of  some 
kind.  They  even  annoyed  Sher  Ali,  the  ruler  of  Kau- 
bul, on  his  return  from  visiting  Lord  Mayo  in  1869;  and 
when  I  was  at  Peshawar  the  Khyber  route  into  Afghan- 
istan was  entirely  closed,  owing  to  the  exactions  prac- 
tised on  travellers  by  the  tribes  who  occupy  it.  More 
recently  some  of  these  people  came  down  to  Peshawar 


THE  AFGHAN  BORDER.  379 

one  night  by  stealth,  and  carried  off  into  their  fastnesses 
the  bandmaster  of  an  English,  or  perhaps  a  Scotch,  regi- 
ment, who  had  fallen  asleep  by  the  roadside  on  his  way 
from  the  sergeants'  mess  to  his  own  quarters,  and  held 
him  to  ransom  fcr  £700,  but  were  finally  induced  to 
accept  a  smaller  sum. 

So  thirty-five  of  the  armed  Afridfs  and  one  piper 
marched  with  me  up  the  Khyber  Pass,  "to  plunder  and 
to  ravish,"  no  doubt,  if  there  had  been  anything  to  plun- 
der. We  saw  some  caves  high  above  the  place  where 
we  stopped  for  breakfast,  but  none  of  the  natives  of  the 
pass  appeared.  We  then  had  a  shooting-match,  in  which 
even  little  boys,  who  carried  matchlock  and  dagger, 
acquitted  themselves  very  well,  played  our  most  insult- 
ing tunes  in  the  face,  or  rather  against  the  back,  of  the 
enemy, — and  marched  back  again.  The  pass  is  so  nar- 
row, and  the  mountains  on  both  sides  of  it  are  so  high 
and  precipitous,  that  the  Khyber  must  be  a  particularly 
unpleasant  place  to  be  attacked  in.  The  entire  length 
of  this  wonderful  gorge  is  nearly  fifty  miles  ;  it  runs 
through  slate,  limestone,  and  sandstone  ;  and  in  wet 
weather  the  path  becomes  the  bed  of  a  torrent.  Near 
Ali  Musjid  the  precipices  rise  from  this  narrow  path  to 
the  height  of  1 200  feet,  at  an  angle  of  about  8o°.  This 
wild  pass  is  said  to  be  able  to  turn  out  26,000  fighting 
men,  and  during  the  Afghan  war  many  of  our  troops 
perished  in  it. 

But  I  must  now  draw  these  observations  to  a  close. 
From  Peshawar  there  was  only  the  long  drive  across  the 
Panjab  to  Lahore,  and  from  Lahore  the  railway  to  Bom- 
bay. This  was  in  the  end  of  December  ;  and  all  across 
the  country  of  the  five  rivers,  afar  off,  high  above  the 
golden  dust  haze,  there  gleamed  the  snowy  summits  of 
the  giant  mountains  whose  whole  line  I  had  traversed 
in  their  central  and  loftiest  vallevs.     The  next  snow  I 


380  THE  ABODE  OF  SNOW, 

beheld  was  on  the  peak  of  Cretan  Ida ;  but  I  had  seen 
the  great  abode  of  the  gods,  where — 

"  Far  in  the  east  HimXliya,  lifting  high 
His  towery  summits  till  they  cleave  the  skv. 
Spans  the  wide  land  from  east  to  western  sea. 
Lord  of  the  Hills,  instinct  with  Deity." 


THE    END. 


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